Examine the role of the National Commission for Minorities in preserving, promoting and protecting the rights of minorities in India. (2017, 15 Marks)
The National Commission for Minorities (NCM) began as a Minorities Commission created by a Home Ministry resolution of 1978. It became statutory under the NCM Act, 1992. Minorities in this sense are non-dominant groups, not merely smaller ones. Under Section 2(c) of the Act the Centre notifies six of them: Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Parsis and, since 2014, Jains. The Commission’s record is uneven across the three tasks the question names. It has done most to promote minorities’ development and least to protect their rights.
Preserving: identity and culture
- The safeguards are Articles 29–30 (culture, language and educational institutions) and Articles 350A–350B (mother-tongue instruction and a Special Officer for linguistic minorities).
- The NCM’s tool is Section 9(1)(b), which lets it monitor these safeguards. In practice, preservation has been secured by courts, not by the Commission. T. M. A. Pai (2002) made the state the unit for deciding minority status, and AMU v. Naresh Agarwal (2024) widened the test for minority institutions.
- Adjudication belongs to a separate body, the National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions (2004). Linguistic minorities fall outside the NCM’s notification altogether.
Promoting: development and equal citizenship
- Under Section 9(1)(a), (f) and (g), it evaluates minorities’ progress, conducts research and suggests measures to governments.
- The need is real. The Sachar Committee (2006) found about one in four Muslim children aged 6–14 never enrolled or had dropped out, and a Muslim share of the IAS of 3%. On some indicators Muslims fell below SCs and STs.
- The response has been weak. Only a small share of the Commission’s budget goes on research. Meanwhile the schemes it is meant to evaluate shrank: the Maulana Azad fellowship was discontinued in 2022.
Protecting: grievances and security
- Under Section 9(1)(d) it looks into complaints, with civil-court powers under Section 9(4). It recorded 568 complaints of violence against minorities between 2014–15 and 2024–25.
- The wording is weaker than that for the NCSC. It may “monitor” and “look into”, not “investigate” and “inquire”.
- It was headless from April 2025 until July 2026, through the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 and the Supreme Court’s interim order of September 2025. The Delhi High Court had to press the Centre to fill the posts.
Why the record is thin
- Status. It is statutory and recommendatory. The Constitution (103rd Amendment) Bill, 2004, which proposed constitutional status, was never passed. No law obliges governments to consult it, unlike Article 338(9) for the NCSC.
- Accountability loop broken. Its annual reports had not been tabled in Parliament since 2010, an Indian Express investigation found in 2020.
- Political composition. All seven members are Centre nominees, so critics read it as an arm of the government of the day. State commissions exist in only about two-thirds of states.
Conclusion
The NCM monitors minorities’ rights more than it protects them. Its contribution has been mainly evidence and voice. Rajeev Bhargava’s “principled distance” makes such an institution necessary. It would need constitutional status, a duty to consult it and a real power of inquiry.