Socially, Financially Developed Castes To Be Deleted From OBC List: Odisha SCBC Chairman

Bhubaneswar: Deserving castes will be included while those which have developed will be excluded from the OBC list, said Justice Raghunath Biswal who took charge as the chairman of Odisha State Commission for Backward Classes (OSCBC) on Saturday.

Along with Biswal, three other members of the Commission- Navneeta Rath, Mitali Chinara and Prasanna Kumar Patra- also assumed office today.

"If any caste should have been in the OBC list but not there, will be listed. In the meantime, if a caste, which is already included in the OBC list, has developed socially and financially over the year, will be deleted from the list," said Biswal.

He further said that the panel will submit its report to the Odisha government after conducting a socio-economic caste survey.

With an aim to protect the interests of backward classes, the Odisha government had constituted OSCBC under the chairmanship of Biswal, a former judge of the Orissa High Court, in accordance with the provisions contained in the Odisha State Commission for Backward Classes Act, 1993.

The Odisha Cabinet had earlier passed a resolution to move Centre for conducting socio-economic caste survey simultaneously along with the general census.

The state government had then said that it should be done either by inserting suitable columns in the Census format or by prescribing a separate format for a simultaneous enumeration of Socially and Educationally Backward Classes and Other Backward Classes/Castes.