Maharashtra govt launches programme to ensure minority youth get maximum jobs in police department

The Shiv Sena-led but NCP-controlled Maha Vikas Aghadi government of Maharashtra has once again put to crude display their discriminatory, pro-minority bias. Minority Affairs Minister of Maharashtra and senior NCP leader Nawab Malik took to twitter to announce that the Maharashtra government will now train ‘minority candidates’ before their selection as police constables in the state police. Effectively, this would increase their chances of getting the job over Hindu candidates’ manifold, as they would have an undue edge over other non-minority candidates, which will almost always be Hindus.

Terming it as “pre-recruitment training”, the Maharashtra government seems overenthusiastic about ensuring ‘maximum appointment’ of minority candidates into the state’s police force, for reasons best known to them. Nawab Malik took to twitter to share a post that read, “Minority youths in the state will be given pre-recruitment training in view of their maximum appointment in the police department.” The announcement further added, “At present, the process of selecting candidates for the training has been started in 14 districts of the state and soon it will be started in the remaining districts as well. Accordingly, direct training will be started later.”

The 14 districts (out of 36) which have been selected for the heavily biased initiative of the Maharashtra government are Wardha, Gadchiroli, Amravati, Nanded, Jalna, Pune, Yuvatmal, Parbhani, Solapur, Aurangabad, Buldhana, Nasik, Beed and Akola. The Maharashtra government’s determination to fill the police department with minority recruits by extending pre-recruitment training to them is not just a blatantly discriminatory move against the ‘majority’ community, but it also hints at a larger game plan to homogenise the police department with ‘minority’ recruits.

Again, what is the definition of the term ‘minority’? Which community stands to gain the most out of such a scheme, and why is such blatant appeasement of the said community being allowed in a ‘secular’ country, a claim which the Congress and NCP make often to shroud their rather brazen affinity towards appeasing Muslims.

The move is nothing short of consolidating the NCP and Congress’ vote banks by pandering to a community which is a majority among the minorities of India. It must be remembered that the NCP has been pushing for 5 per cent Muslim quota in the state’s government jobs, and Nawab Malik had even gone to the extent of suggesting that the government would bring in an ordinance to the same effect. Meanwhile, activists and vested-interest groups are even pushing for the “pre-recruitment training” scheme to be rolled out immediately in all of the state’s 36 districts. Apparently, 14 districts with a large ‘minority-community’ police force are not satisfactory to Maharashtra government.