JOB RESERVATIONS FOR LOCALS

JOB RESERVATIONS FOR LOCALS

TOPIC: Polity

Context- The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Thursday granted an interim stay on the controversial law for reservation of 75% jobs in private companies, societies and trusts for local Haryana candidates.

Concept-

• Prior to Haryana, States such as Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh also tried to provide reservation in private jobs.

About Haryana State Employment of Local Candidates Bill, 2020

• It provides for a 75 per cent job quota for local people in private sector jobs which offer a salary of less than Rs. 50,000 a month.
• The law applies to private companies, societies, trusts, and partnership firms, among others, located in the state. Furthermore, it is applicable to organizations having 10 or more employees.
• It will be applicable to the new job openings only and won’t affect the outsiders already working in the private sector.
• Penalty for non-compliance ranges from Rs. 10,000 to Rs. 2,00,000 rupees.
• A domicile certificate would be mandatory for the candidate seeking benefit under the law.

Constitutional Provisions related to reservations in employment:

The constitution under Article 16 and Article 371 mentions the Reservation in jobs.

• Article 16(1): It provides for equality of opportunity for all citizens in matters relating to ’employment or appointment’ to any office under the State.
• Article 16(2): It provides that there cannot be any discrimination on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, descent, place of birth, residence or any of them.
• Article 16(3): It provides an exception by saying that Parliament may make a law “prescribing” a requirement of residence for jobs in a particular state. This power vests solely in the Parliament, not state legislatures.
• Article 371: Some states have special protections under Article 371. Andhra Pradesh under Section 371(d) has powers to have “direct recruitment of local cadre” in specified areas.

Supreme Court Judgements regarding reservation in private jobs

• Pradeep Jain v Union of India (1984) case: The Supreme Court discussed the issue of legislation for “sons of the soil”. Further, The court held an opinion that such policies would be unconstitutional but did not expressly rule on it.
• Sunanda Reddy v State of Andhra Pradesh (1995) case: The Supreme Court repeated its earlier interpretation in Dr Pradeep Jain case. Further, the court strikes down the state government policy that gave 5% extra weightage to candidates who had studied with Telugu as the medium of instruction.
• The Rajasthan government gave preference to “people belonging to the concerned district or the rural areas of that district” in appointments. But, in 2002 the Supreme Court invalidated the appointment of government teachers in Rajasthan.
• In 2019, the Allahabad High Court struck down a recruitment notification issued by the Uttar Pradesh Subordinate Service Selection Commission. The commission prescribed preference for women who were original residents of the state in job appointments.