The Omar Abdullah government set up a three-member sub-committee in 2024 to study the current reservation quota and suggest measures to increase the Open Merit category quota to 50%. | Photo credit: Imran Nissar
A proposal to rationalize the current reservation quota, which pushes the ‘Open Merit’ category to around 30%, has been sent to Governor Manoj Sinha for his approval, J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah said on Thursday (Dec 04, 2025).
“The file was signed yesterday (Wednesday) and sent to the governor for review. We hope he will approve it and the order will be issued after that,” Mr Abdullah said. However, Mr. Abdullah did not reveal the details of the proposal.
The Omar Abdullah government set up a three-member sub-committee in 2024 to study the current reservation quota and suggest measures to increase the Open Merit category quota to 50%.
In March 2024, the LG approved 10% reservation for newly scheduled tribes, including Paharis, as Scheduled Tribes (STs) and added 15 new castes as Other Backward Classes (OBCs). LG’s move reduced the Open Merit quota to around 30%. This triggered a major street campaign by Open Merit students and aspirants.
The current policy has a reservation of 20% for Scheduled Tribes (STs); 8% for Scheduled Castes (SC); 10% for Reserved Return Areas (RBA); 8% for other backward classes; 4% for local area/integrated boundary candidates; 10% for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS); and 10% for children of defense personnel, sports, disabled etc. Earlier J&K had only 10% reservation for STs.
Several parties in J&K have raised concerns that the Omar Abdullah government is reducing the RBA and EWS quotas to increase the Open Merit quota. Groups that fall under the RBA category have already opposed any reduction in their quotas.
“The RBA’s share of reservation policy has been drastically reduced from 20% to 10% in 2020, even though the community constitutes about 25% of the total population. Any reduction scheme violates the principles of equity, equity and social justice,” the RBA group aspirants said in a joint letter to the chief minister.
The J&K Students’ Association (JKSA) has submitted a policy report to the CM Secretariat advising “not to reduce EWS or RBA quotas”, a JKSA spokesperson said. “Instead, we have recommended reforming and updating the income, land and economic progress criteria to make the reservation framework fairer, data-driven and fairer for all,” JKSA said.
Imran Reza Ansari, general secretary of the J&K Peoples Conference, said the National Conference-led government’s changes in the RBA and EWS reservation will be a “calculated attack on vulnerable Kashmiri-speaking communities masquerading as reform”.
“It will not be reform but linguistic gymnastics staged robbery. I call it ‘Rob Peter to pay Paul’ and then I will give Paul a platform to lecture Peter about equality while they are both ripped off by this spineless and visionless government,” Mr Ansari said.
The BJP has also warned against tampering with EWS and RBA quotas. “The National Conference has directly hit the rights of the poorest sections of the society — the EWS category of the economically weaker section and the RBA category of villages without facilities, without schools, without roads, without basic infrastructure. These two classes have been targeted and restricted,” said BJP spokesperson Altaf Thakur.
Published – 04 Dec 2025 21:50 IST
