Dr. Dinesh
The Andaman & Nicobar Islands occupy a distinctive place in India’s national geography, remote and strategically indispensable. Yet, when it comes to public employment, the Islands continue to operate under recruitment frameworks designed for vastly different socio-economic conditions on the mainland. This administrative uniformity, though convenient, has begun to produce consequences that are increasingly unfair to the island population and potentially harmful to the region’s long-term stability.
Demands for 100% reservation in government jobs for domiciled island residents are not driven by parochial anxieties or partisan motivations. They arise from the lived realities of an isolated and fragile island economy, the absence of diversified private sector employment, limited agricultural potential, lack of industrial clusters, and chronic infrastructural constraints relating to water, power, logistics, and connectivity. In such an environment, government employment becomes one of the few stable avenues for social mobility. When these posts are filled predominantly by non-residents, local youth are left without viable alternatives.
Recent recruitment patterns illustrate this imbalance.
In a Veterinary Department Out of 88 posts, unreserved posts were filled by mainlanders. Reserved posts not filled due to non-availability of candidates.
A few years earlier, a substantial cadre of nurses in the Health Department was recruited from outside the Islands. For a small and demographically sensitive Union Territory, such disproportionate outcomes are more than surprising; they challenge the legitimacy of public institutions and undermine social equity.
Comparisons with Ladakh are instructive. Recognizing Ladakh’s frontier character and narrow employment ecosystem, the Government of India introduced domicile-linked reservation norms shortly after the Union Territory’s formation. The policy derived constitutional support from Article 16(3), which empowers Parliament to prescribe residence requirements for public employment, and from jurisprudence permitting reasonable classification when such classification pursues legitimate public objectives, protecting fragile populations, promoting balanced development, or maintaining social stability.
Similar frameworks exist across other states and Union Territories. Northeastern states rely on Inner Line Permit regimes and Sixth Schedule protections; Jammu & Kashmir adopted domicile rules after its reorganization; hill states such as Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand restrict certain government posts to domiciles; and Lakshadweep, another strategically-located island territory, employs administrative safeguards to ensure local participation. These examples affirm that domicile-based reservation is neither unconstitutional nor exceptional; it is a pragmatic instrument of territorial justice that strengthens, rather than fragments, national unity.
The Andaman & Nicobar Islands share all the characteristics that justified such frameworks elsewhere. Economically, the region remains dependent on government and public-sector employment. Demographically, the Islands accommodate a mosaic of communities, indigenous tribes and settler populations including Tamilians, Bengalis, Telugus, Ranchis, Malayalis, Moplahs, Punjabis, Karens of Webi, Srilankan of Katchal and others, many whose families have been settled in the Islands since the pre-Independence era. Their combined population capacity is naturally limited by geography. Continuous inflows that displace local participation in state institutions would be a grave administrative miscalculation.
An additional dimension concerns the cumulative pressure on civic resources. Recruited personnel from the mainland do not merely occupy posts; they eventually bring families and relatives, adding incremental load on housing, power supply, water, transport, and healthcare, sectors already stretched near saturation. Over time, temporary employment migration risks transforming into permanent settlement, altering demographic balances and increasing fiscal burdens without proportional economic generation.
For mainlanders, the Islands represent an attractive career station, better allowances, secure postings, and comparatively low competition. For locals, the same jobs are a lifeline. When the former take the latter’s share, the imbalance widens, as mainlanders can return to the mainland for future opportunities, while islanders have nowhere else to go.
An asymmetry in employment opportunities further compounds the issue. Youth from mainland states can access two job markets, their own State government posts, often restricted through domicile norms, and Central government employment. Islanders have access only to the latter, being ineligible for state-level public employment outside the territory. This creates a one-way economic flow, outsiders may enter island jobs, but island youth cannot access reciprocal opportunities elsewhere. Left unaddressed, such asymmetry will erode inter-generational equity and social cohesion.
Crucially, the demand for reservation is apolitical. Governments may alternate, but the consequences of neglect will be borne by future generations of islanders. If current hiring trends persist, twenty years hence the Islands may witness rising unemployment among local youth, outward migration of talent, demographic displacement in public services, and diminished representation in state institutions. These pressures are structural, not partisan.
There are encouraging signs. The present BJP leadership appears cognizant of the matter and has reached the highest levels of political and administrative attention. The past decade has shown that when political will aligns with constitutional reasoning, differentiated solutions are possible. Ladakh stands as evidence that where there is a will, the Constitution provides a way.
In the interim, the ongoing online recruitment mechanism may be placed in abeyance pending a comprehensive assessment of its impact on the island population. What is now required is a calibrated mechanism, through Parliamentary action under Article 16(3) or an executive regulatory framework, to secure 100% reservation for domiciled islanders in government employment. Such a measure would rest on firm constitutional footing, align with strategic imperatives, and safeguard democratic equity in a frontier territory.
For the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, reservation is not a privilege. It is a corrective measure rooted in economic justice, constitutional principle, and national interest. The window for such intervention is narrow; it is, quite genuinely, now or never.