Govt. to examine proposal aimed at ensuring fair community representation on minorities panel

The Kerala government has, in principle, agreed to examine a recommendation that no particular minority community should get disproportionate representation in the Kerala State Commission for Minorities. The decision has been made clear in a General Administration department order dated March 2.

The recommendation has come as part of the report of the J.B. Koshy Commission on Christian Minorities which the State government had recently published. The commission opined that it would be appropriate if the Chairman and the member of the Kerala State Commission for Minorities were picked from different minority communities.

What prompted the commission to make its recommendation were certain representations it received pertaining to the replacement of a single word with another when the Kerala State Commission for Minorities Act was amended in 2018.

In the Act, the section on the constitution of the State Commission for Minorities states that its chairperson should be an individual belonging to a minority community. The original subsections went on to add that of the remaining two members, one should be “a member belonging to another minority community” and the other, a woman belonging to minority community.

The commission notes in its report that when the Act was amended in 2018, the word ‘another’ in the first instance was replaced with ‘a.’ This change, in effect, allows the chairman and member to be from the same community.

The commission noted that the government should look into this matter since it requires the consideration of the State Assembly.