Article 340

Article 340

Subject :Polity

Context: Three-time Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Samajwadi Party founder Mulayam Singh Yadav passed away at a private Gurugram hospital on Monday

Article 340:

• The President may by order appoint a Commission consisting of such persons as he thinks fit to investigate the conditions of socially and educationally backward classes within the territory of India and the difficulties under which they labour and to make recommendations as to the steps that should be taken by the Union or any State to remove such difficulties and to improve their condition.
• Article 340 of the Constitution entailed egalitarian possibility that resulted in two Backward Classes commissions, the Kalelkar Commission (1953-1955) and the Mandal Commission (1978-80).
• The Kalelkar Commission didn’t yield anything.
• The mobilisation campaign for implementing the recommendations of the Mandal Commission to a “Mandal movement”. The announcement of implementing one of its recommendations, of 27% reservation for the Other Backward Classes (OBC) in the central services on August 7, 1990, was the “Mandal moment”.