![[File] Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani | PTI](https://img.theweek.in/content/dam/week/news/india/images/2019/5/29/narendra-modi-vijay-rupani-pti29519.jpg "[File] Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani | PTI")
Days after the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party made a clean sweep of all the 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat, the state government is all set to implement a 10 per cent reservation for the economically weaker class of people falling in unreserved category. The scheme was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi months before the general elections.
A decision to this effect was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Vijay Rupani in Gandhinagar on Tuesday.
Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel said that the scheme will be implemented in all higher education admissions from the new academic year 2019-20.
Patel said that a total of 6,809 seats will be added to the existing 31,890 seats in medical, para medical and allied courses. A new medical college will come up in Amreli, Saurashtra.
He said that in architecture, pharmacy and engineering, a total of 40,000 seats would be added.
“Gujarat becomes the first state in the country to implement this,” Patel said, adding that any student whose annual family income is less than Rs 8 lakh and is not taking benefit under any other scheme will get the benefit of the scheme. During the admission process, these seats will be kept aside and reservation of any other category will not be affected, he held.
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Ten per cent reservation for the economically weaker section assumes large significance in Gujarat as the Patidars had been demanding reservation. Though Patels are powerful in the state, leaders like Hardik Patel have been claiming that a large chunk of the community remain poor.
Hardik joined the Congress before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. A vocal critic of Modi, Hardik has been in the news for last couple of years. He is out on bail in a sedition case.
The Patidar quota stir was also responsible for the ruling BJP's not so good performance in the 2017 assembly elections. Its tally stopped at 99 in the 182-member assembly.
Albeit, Hardik failed to make any impact in the recently concluded parliament elections.
