NEW DELHI: The striking doctors and medical students on Sunday rejected the Central Government's new draft proposal on the reservation policy — that it would examine the demand for setting up an experts committee to review the issue.

The Centre had come out with the proposal in an attempt to end the fortnight-long strike against 27 per cent reservation for the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in institutions of higher education.

The students asserted that the strike would continue.

Amitasha Sinha of the Youth for Equality said the draft mentioned only an increase in the medical seats, whereas the fight was for all subjects. "Just because the medical students are leading, it does not mean that we are not fighting for the others," she said. There was no assurance on increasing the seats in the general category. The increase in seats applied to all categories and reservation would reduce the general category seats, she said.

"The Government has taken note of the various concerns expressed by the medical students and their demand for constituting an experts committee and will get them examined,'' Minister of State (without portfolio) Oscar Fernandes told reporters after the second round of talks with the striking students.

The Government assured the students that it would mobilise resources to create the infrastructure and consider increasing the retirement age of the faculty once the number of seats was increased. "The general category students will not be affected,'' Mr. Fernandes said, adding that the students could submit their suggestions to the technical committees of the Oversight Committee.

The Oversight Committee, to be headed by Veerappa Moily, chairperson of the Administrative Reforms Committee, will have four or five sub-committees that will help draw the road map for the implementation of the reservation policy from June 2007.

Mr. Fernandes assured the students that no action would be taken against the agitators.The new draft comes in the wake of the resentment expressed by the students that some of the assurances given by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during a meeting with them on Friday did not reflect in the official statement issued subsequently. "We have tried to come back to the students to try and clarify the specific issues raised by them on Sunday morning and hope that this should satisfy them,'' Mr. Fernandes said after he met Dr. Singh in the evening.

The students met Mr. Fernandes, Union Health and Family Welfare Secretary P.K. Hota and the Prime Minister's Principal Secretary, T.K.A. Nair, in the morning and sought clarifications on the assurances. The officials had promised to get back to them after meeting Mr. Singh.

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