
The National Commission for Vice-Chairman of Kasta ARUN Haldar shall present the annual report of the Commission 2022-23 to President Draupadi Murmum on February 16, 2024. The report must still be laid in parliament. Photo: pib.gov.in
More than a dozen key annual reports on national commissions for planned castes (SCS), planned tribes (STS) and other reverse classes (OVC) have not been published for up to seven years. While the National Commission for Planned Kasty (NCSC) and the National Commission for Planned Tribes (NCST) have not submitted their annual reports to the President in the last two years, the National Return Class (NCBC) Commission (NCBC) is behind three years.
These three commissions have a constitutional mandate to present these reports to the President annually by reviewing the implementation of guarantees for these communities. This mandate also gives the powers of panels to recommend all the necessary measures that the Government of the Union and State Administration could take for the “protection, social and socio-economic development” of these communities.
In the past, these recommendations have come to a wide range of policy creation, including various aspects of reservations, criteria for the exclusion of creamy strata, community categorization and health and infrastructure interventions.
In addition to the above-mentioned seven reports, the NCSC annual report from 2022-23, presented to the President in mid-February 2024, must be in parliament. Similarly, five NCST annual reports were submitted to the President, from 2018-19 to 2022-23, but has not yet been submitted in parliament.
The regular procedure for publishing these reports requires the government to lay them in parliament with the concept of concept. Those who were aware of the work of the panels explained that because the reports deal with a wide range of entities, including persons related to state governments, these are events that concerned a lot of time.
NCSC officials said the Commission has been working on annual reports in the last two years and “will be submitted to the President soon”. NCST officials said the annual report for 2023-24 would be “printed” soon and the 2024-25 team was created for the fragmentation report.
NCBC chairman Hansraram Ahir told the Hinds that the annual reports for 2022-23 and 2023-24 were “filmed when we speak” and will soon be submitted to the President. “We are also working on the annual report 2024-25,” he said.
Former NCST official told the Hindes that in addition to action reports, they are time consuming: “There was a question of how many sources have panels to prepare messages and priorities that the nodal ministries give to these reports”.
“There were cases where reports were submitted in parliament so late that the recommendations of the commission are often made unnecessary or irrelevant,” he said, demanding anonymity.
For example, the NCST 2015-16 report was laid in parliament in 2019 and its annual reports for 2016–17 and 2017–18 were laid in parliament in 2023. “Ideally, sources and experts who can work on these reports during the year.”
Published – April 25, 2025 20:53