West Bengal 2006 - 2010:Touching New Milestones(5)

History in the making in Minority Welfare

· Apart from ensuring reservations, the Left Front Government is committed to holistic development of the minority community in the State. In 1976-77, the then State Government used to spend a meagre amount of Rs. 560000 for the development of Madrasah Education. The allocation under the same head in 2009-10 is a whooping Rs.610 Crore!

· 105 New Madrasahs have been set-up in the tenure of the Seventh Left Front Government alone. 400 Madrasah Education Centres have also come into being in the same period. Construction work of 300 more MSKs and 200 SSKs is under progress.

· The Seventh Left Front Government has accorded recognition to the Madrasahs as Institutions for Minorities.

· The Madrasah Service Commission was constituted in 2008. This Commission has appointed more than 4000 Teachers between 2007 and 2009, of whom 93% belong to Minority Communities.

· The West Bengal Minority Development and Finance Corporation have assisted 345000 beneficiaries in 2009-10 by granting Rs.116.50 Crore in their favour, for Self Employment and Training of entrepreneurs belonging to Minority Communities. The Corporation’s performance is the best in the country.

· The amounts earmarked for payment of scholarships, financial grants etc. to minority students have been largely enhanced. The number of beneficiaries has multiplied accordingly.

· District level offices of the Minority Welfare Department have started functioning in 11 districts of the State from the last year. A Minority Cell is operational in the remaining districts.

· Alia University was established in 2007. The State Government has declared it as an Institution for the Minorities. Altogether 327 posts in various disciplines have been created for the Alia University within the last one year.

· A new Haj House has been constructed near Kolkata Airport in the tenure of the present State Government. There are in all 9 Haj Houses in the whole country. 2 of those are in West Bengal.

· 158 Police Constables out of 612 recruited in October 2009 belong to minority communities.

· Inclusion of at least one member of minority community in Selection Committees constituted for supervising public recruitment has been made mandatory.

· Empowerment of women belonging to minority communities is one of the exceptional areas of success of the State Government. The project for empowering women envisages implementation of various programmes, besides assisting SHGs.

· Nowhere in India but in West Bengal are the SHGs comprising of women from minority communities, provided with a 50% subsidy.

· The work for establishing English-medium Madrasahs has taken off only during the regime of the Seventh Left Front Government.

· This Government has initiated the popular West Bengal State Madrasah Sports Meet.

Muslims as OBCs enjoy Reservation – West Bengal is the Pioneer

· In a historic move, the Seventh Left Front Government has brought 53 Muslim communities within the ambit of reservation quota as OBCs on the basis of their backwardness. Among the 53 more backward communities identified, 49 are Muslims. The remaining 4 Muslim communities have been identified as Backward. About 172 Lakh out of the 202 Lakh strong Muslim population of the State are now in the reservation list. This is totally unprecedented in the country.