Lucknow: Even as th BJP bends backwards to woo Muslims, the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh has decided to scrap minority quota under various schemes launched by former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav.
Former Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav had reserved 20 per cent quota for minorities in about 85 welfare schemes being run by his government.
“This is in keeping with our policy of no discrimination and no appeasement. We are in the process of reviewing all the schemes. We will continue those which we consider are important but scrap others,” deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said here on Monday.
He explained that Muslims and other communities will continue to get benefit of all schemes if they fulfill the eligibility criteria.
“It is not that we are depriving any one community - anyone and everyone who meets the specifications, can avail the benefits of the schemes but there will be no reservation on basis of religion", he said.
The Samajwadi Party had promised in its manifesto to treat all Muslims as ‘most backward’ and provide reservation to them in proportion to their population.
Samajwadi leader Ram Govind Chaudhary said that the decision to keep a quota for Muslims in all schemes was done with the intention of ensuring that the minorities get benefits of every government schemes.
However, hours after Keshav Maurya said that the Yogi government would scrap quota for Muslims in government schemes as part of its ‘no discrimination, no appeasement policy’, senior UP minister Ramapati Shastri claimed that there was no such plan.
