REGARDING EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY IN MATTERS OF PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT AND PROMOTION IN THE PROVISION OF LAW

There shall be equality of opportunity for all citizens in matters relating to employment or appointment to any office under the State (2) No citizen shall, on grounds only of religion, race , caste, sex, descent, place of birth, residence or any of them, be ineligible for, or discriminated against in respect of, any employment or office under the State. (3) Nothing in this article shall prevent Parliament from making any law prescribing, in regard to a class or classes of employment or appointment to an office, under the Government of, or any local or other authority within, a State or Union territory, any requirement as to residence within that State or Union territory, prior to such, employment or appointment. (4) Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any provision for the reservation of appointments, or posts in favor of any backward class of citizens which, in the opinion of the State, is not adequately represented in the services under the State. (4A) Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any provision for reservation, in matters of promotion, with consequential seniority, to any class or classes of posts in the services under the State in favor of the Schedule caste and the Schedule tribes which, in the opinion of the State are not adequately represented in the services under the State. (4B) Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from considering any unfilled vacancies of a year which are reserved for being filled up in that year in accordance with any provision for reservation made under clause (4) or clause (4A) as a separate class of vacancies to be filled up in any succeeding year or years and such class of vacancies shall not be considered together with vacancies of the year in which they are being filled up for determining the ceiling if fifty percent, reservation on total number of vacancies of that year. (5) Nothing in this article shall effect the operation of any law which provides that the incumbent of an office in connection with the affairs of any religious or denominational institution or any member of the governing body thereof shall be a person professing a particular religion or belonging to a particular denomination.