When will Naveen govt implement EWS quota in educational institutions?

Bhubaneswar: At a time when the Modi government has already implemented the 10 per cent reservation for the economically weaker sections (EWS) of the general category across all colleges and universities, including private institutions, from the 2019-20 academic year; Odisha government is yet to implement the quota in State-run educational institutions.

Premier institutions in Odisha like IIT Bhubaneswar, IIM Sambalpur, NIT Rourkela, Central University in Koraput and Institute of Physics in Bhubaneswar will implement the reservation from this academic session. The Union HRD ministry has already directed these institutions for the same.

"Our admission process is on. We have a total of 132 seats out of which, 12 seats have been reserved for candidates from the economically weaker section. Three students have already taken admission in EWS quota," said Director of IIM Sambalpur, MP Jaiswal.

Vice-Chancellor of NIT Rourkela, Pradeep Kumar Das also said that the 10 per cent quota for EWS students has already been implemented in the institution for the current academic session.

Earlier, the HRD Ministry had written to all the states to implement the same in state-run educational institutions. However, when asked about the EWS quota, the top official of the Department of Higher Education, Odisha, refused to reply but admitted that a decision in this regard is yet to be taken.

"The State government should implement the reservation as it is a Central provision. If premier institutes like IIT and NIT are implementing the quota for EWS candidates, there should not be any problem in implementing it in state govt-run institutions. I hope the Odisha government will implement it soon," said an educationist, Kamal Prasad Mohapatra.