Plea seeking reservation for orphans filed in SC

A plea, which seeks reservation for the orphans in all the schemes where reservation is given to any other weaker section of the society, has been filed in the Apex Court. The plea was filed by a writer, Polumi Pavini Sharma

New Delhi: Polumi Pavini Sharma, a writer, has moved to the Supreme Court seeking reservation for the orphans in all the schemes where reservation is given to any other weaker section of the society.

In her petition, she has also prayed to have an official survey to estimate the "extent of the children in need of care and protection problem."

Polumi, arguing as a petitioner in person, contended in the court on Monday that orphans have been excluded explicitly from the Right to Education. She said that there is no provision for them to get reservation and 18 lakhs children have already aged out.

She contends that there are no scholarships or fellowships, no coaching for an examination, no micro-credit or loans concessional rate, no reservation in educational institutions, jobs and no provision of any kind for any orphan to go for professional or higher studies after passing 10+2 at 18 years of age.

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Her petition contends that there are more than 20 million orphans in India and the government has never done an official survey to estimate the number (20 million is according to the UN).

"Total budgetary allocation for Children protection in 2018-19 is Rs 725 crore, which translates to less than Rs 1 per child a day. Meanwhile, the government of India has pumped in over Rupees 23,000 crores to keep Air India afloat in the last 5 years", reads the release of Sharma on her petition.

Sharma said that by a notification these orphan children can be included but they have been included only in Delhi and other states like Uttar Pradesh have been left out.

The writer has written the book "Weakest on earth" which is about orphans and them facing the ordeal.