Union minister Upendra Kushwaha calls for quotas in judiciary at event to commemorate Ambedkar Jayanti

Upendra Kushwaha, Union minister and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP), on Saturday, rued the lack of representation of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the judiciary. He called for introducing a quota system in the judiciary for the SC/ST and OBC communities, India Today reported. He was speaking at an event organised by RLSP in Bihar to commemorate BR Ambedkar’s 127th birth anniversary [caption id=“attachment_4431857” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File image of Upendra Kushwaha. Image courtesy: Twitter/@UpendraRSLP[/caption] On 9 April too, he had called for changes in the present system of employment in the judiciary to ensure that it gets adequate representation from all sections of the society. Kushwaha, who is the Minister of State for Human Resource Development in the NDA government led by BJP’s Narendra Modi, had made this statement in Kishanganj, Bihar. Expressing concern over the 2 April Bharat Bandh against a Supreme Court judgment “diluting” the SC/ST Act, Kushwaha said the magnitude of the protests was a warning signal for the country’s democratic setup. The Bharat Bandh called by Dalit and tribal organisations, and supported by many Opposition parties, had resulted in large-scale violence in states like Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. “A tea-seller can rise to the position of the prime minister and children of daily wage labourers can become district magistrates and superintendents of police. Yet, it is hard for anybody from a humble background to become a judge under the present system,” Kushwaha had told reporters. With inputs from PTI