Bangalore: Vacancies in the Karnataka Public Service Commission (KPSC) are reserved for particular castes and communities. When a member retires, only a member of his caste or community can succeed him. For instance, only a Muslim can succeed a retiring Muslim.

Whatever the Constitution of India might say on the issue, in Karnataka it is a convention that has the force of law.

True, such a scheme existed in the Federal Court with the Chief Justice being an Englishman and the two puisne judges drawn from among Hindus and Muslims.

Up for grabs

The question being raised is whether the coalition government of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Janata Dal (Secular) will be bold enough to break the convention considering the criticism that coalitions in the State have compounded the problem of politicisation of decision making. For the Kumaraswamy government, membership of the KPSC is up for grabs from the political angle. There are five vacancies. Only two months ago, the State Cabinet increased the number of KPSC members from six to seven, besides the Chairman.

Political gameplan

According to highly placed sources in the ruling combine, the JD(S) chief, H.D. Deve Gowda, is preparing to turn the tables on his political bete noire, the former Deputy Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. For some time now, Mr. Gowda has been calling for separate reservation for Kurubas and Idigas on the ground that they are cornering the benefits of reservation in education and employment to the detriment of the 120-odd minor castes listed in Category II A of the State's scheme of reservation. Mr. Siddaramaiah is a Kuruba. Mr. Gowda wants the 15 per cent reservation earmarked for Category II A divided among the various castes on population basis.

This triggered protests from Mr. Siddaramaiah and other leaders of the two castes.

Another member

According to sources, Mr. Gowda is thinking of recommending to the Government that it nominate a person from among the 120-odd other backward classes (OBCs) in Category II A to the KPSC to ensure that the interests of these castes are protected.

Mr. Gowda might not go against the Kurubas in the matter of KPSC membership and will allow the nomination of one member from that caste. He is stated to be in favour of appointing an academic from the smaller castes also this time.

The KPSC now has only two members: Dasaiah, who belongs to a Scheduled Caste, and Venkataswamy, a former Joint Commissioner of Commercial Taxes. The Chairman is H.N. Krishna.

Convention

The convention is that the KPSC should comprise one member each from among Lingayats, Vokkaligas, Muslims, Christians and Scheduled Castes and two from the OBCs (generally one Kuruba).

Only one Brahmin has served as a member of the KPSC in the 55 years of its existence. It was M.S. Swaminathan, a senior IAS officer, who served from 1971 to 1973. The present Chairman, Dr. Krishna, a dentist, is a Vokkaliga.

Another interesting feature of the composition of the KPSC is that there is "reservation" for an officer of the Commercial Taxes Department.

There is no reason why a particular government department should be preferred. It is the opinion of many that people with an academic background and experience in conducting examinations should be appointed to the commission.

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