Bhubaneswar: The union minister of state for social justice and empowerment, Ramdas Athawale, Tuesday directed the Odisha government to implement the 10% reservation quota for the higher caste economically backward people.

The minister, while speaking at a presser, said that the Central government has introduced the reservation quota for economically backward people of higher caste recently. This reservation need to be implemented at the State level, he asserted.

Athawale said that there is need to check the atrocities on dalits and oppressed people of the society. He said that Odisha has registered 1002 cases of atrocities against dalits in the State during the six months of this calendar year. The number of cases was 1775 in 2018. The minister stressed on inter-caste marriage to reduce the cases of dalit atrocities.

Stating that Rs 382 crore has been given as student scholarship in Odisha, he said that while 1,90,314 students have got pre-matric scholarship of Rs 60 crore, 2,03,963 students have received post-matric scholarship of Rs 322 crore.