According to reports coming out on Wednesday, the Madhya Pradesh government has issued a notification granting 35% reservation for women in all government recruitment, barring only the Forest Department. This was done through an amendment to the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services (Special Provision for Appointment of Women) Rules, 1997.
The notification mentions, “Notwithstanding anything contained in any service rules, there shall be reserved 35 percent of all posts in the service under the state (except Forest Department) in favour of women at the stage of direct recruitment, and the said reservation shall be horizontal and compartment-wise.”
The Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, also recently announced during a speech that for Police and other government jobs, there will be a 35% reservation for women across the board for all vacancies and government school teachers, he announced that efforts are being made to reserve 50% of the posts for women.
The Chief Minister also announced some other programs as well, like the “Ladli Bahna Yojana”, the BJP governments flagship welfare scheme for women, through which financial assistance of Rs. 1,250 would be provided to the beneficiaries directly on the 10th of every month.
It is yet to be seen what impact this will have on the elections of the poll-bound state.
