SHILLONG, April 20: The Meghalaya High Court on Wednesday granted three weeks to the state government to introduce a roster system for implementation of the State Reservation Policy.
Hearing a public interest litigation (PIL), the division bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice W Diengdoh said, “The state seeks some time to introduce the roster system. Accordingly, let the matter stand over for three weeks.”
The court also reminded the state government that the roster system is relevant only for entry-level posts, unless reservation is also provided for promotions.
“Further, to ascertain what categories of persons would be next recruited, it is necessary to formulate a roster and apply the roster to all entry-level posts since the time the reservation policy came into effect, including cadres that were born after the reservation policy came into effect,” it said.
“Upon ascertaining the position in respect of each entry-level post, will it be possible to assess how the discrepancies, if any, may be addressed by inviting more applications in future recruitments from categories which have been under-represented so that at a given point of time there is no further discrepancy,” the court said in its order.
The court observed that it is an enormous task for the exercise to be conducted for every entry-level post across government offices, including other government organisations where the reservation policy applies and gave two weeks to the state to complete the same exercise as far as the High Court and the District judiciary is concerned.
The next hearing is scheduled on May 11.
