The Indian Institutes of Technology for the first time since their inception have begun drafting plans to implement the quota for faculty members from this year onwards, despite protests from the IIT student community and opposition from some professors.
A few IITs are calling a board meeting next week to discuss the issue and chalk out a plan to this effect.
The Human Resource Development ministry has, meanwhile, assured the country's premier technical institutes that they can de-reserve the posts after a year if vacant till then.
IITs, according to a HRD directive, are expected to reserve 15 per cent quota for SCs, 7.5 per cent for STs and 27 per cent for OBCs in faculty positions.
However, till date, they only have had reservations for backward category candidates in administrative posts. They had not implemented quotas in faculty positions till date for 'lack of a written directive'. Sources in the HRD ministry, however, allege that the IITs 'skirted the issue till date'.
The ministry has now written to the IITs asking them to furnish faculty data of the past three years. "We have given the details to the MHRD. We did try recruiting SC/ST faculty but could not do so as we could not find anyone with the required qualification," explains an IIT Guwahati professor.
"IITs always had quota for faculty. We, however, did not have a written directive from the MHRD on this issue. Besides, the clause that IITs can de-reserve the posts after a year, helps us put the quota in place," says an IIT director who did not wish to be named.
However, the severe faculty shortage issue at IITs may not get solved since "there being a dearth of quality faculty, the faculty seats anyway go vacant at the IITs. By reserving the seats for quota, it will not be much of a difference," said another IIT director. IIT Guwahati, for instance, had invited applications from candidates for the SC/ST faculty seats earlier.
It shortlisted four candidates, but could not recruit any as they did not match the qualification criteria.
Incidentally, last week, the IIT directors met in New Delhi at the meeting of the standing committee of the IIT council and requested that they should be exempted from making reservations for faculty like the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and Bhabha Atomic Research Centre.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Centre and the University Grants Commission on a petition challenging the policy of extending reservation for the OBCs to faculty posts in the IITs, the Indian Institutes of Management, Jawaharlal Nehru University and the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences.