It is NDF is declared policy to work for Social Justice and to ensure that all backward sections get what is legitimately due to them.  For eg, in Kerala, NDF strongly stands for the implementation of Justice Narendran Commission report which is connected to the denial of adequate representation for five to eight Backward Class communities in  Kerala Government service. Backward communities like the Dheevaras, Vishwakarmas, Latin Catholics and converted Christians did not have sufficient representation, while the Muslim community is the worst-affected. NDF has always considered the reservation issue as an ideological and fundamental one. The organization took a firm stand on this issue affecting the Backward Classes

What is Narendran Commission and its Report?

It was appointed by the former CPM-led LDF Government in February 2000 to study and report on the pattern of representation of Backward Classes in the State public services Headed by former judge of Kerala High Court Justice K.K. Narendran, the Commission had as its members former chairman of Kerala Public Service Commission (KPSC) T.M. Savan Kutty, and former Chief Secretary K. V. Rabindran Nair. After one-and-half years of study, the panel submitted the final report in September 2001 after the present Congress-led UDF government headed by A. K. Antony occupied power in May 2001. The Commission made its analysis for the two-part report on the basis of data collected from different sources, especially the KPSC and heads of 299 different wings like government departments, public sector undertakings, universities and autonomous institutions. There were irritants about non-receipt of required data from different source in time.

The Commission's findings were worth revealing: The representation of backward communities in the State service in general was `clearly inadequate' ; However, the extent of inadequacy varied from community to community as Eazhavas got better representation on merit quota while the Muslims lagged behind; Although the due quota share of BCs is 40 per cent, as on August 01, 2001, they together got 48.23 per cent (1,57,008) of the 3,25,554 employees in all the Government departments and judiciary in Kerala as against 38.73 per cent posts occupied by the forward communities.

The Commission findings exposed that although the BCs put together had exceeded their representation of reservation job quota, this benefit was uneven among various backward communities and within communities, among different categories of employment. Thus, as against Ezhavas, who have far exceeded their quota in all the six categories analysed by the Commission and who secured 20.41 per cent of all jobs in Government departments, the total share of jobs occupied by Muslims is only 10.45 per cent. Further, as against the Muslims exceeding the quota marginally in Category 1 (10.3 per cent against quota of 10 per cent), they fell short in the remaining five categories of 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 in which they secured only 10.66, 9.85, 11.63, 9.94 and 9.71 respectively against their quota share of 12 per cent.

Like Muslims, other BC representation also remained far below their due quota share. Thus, the representation of Nadars, who have a total of 1.90 per cent in all the categories taken together, had fallen short marginally in category one (2.83 against 3 per cent) experienced sharper shortfall in other categories. Similarly, the Viswakarmas, with total 2.91 per cent representation in all the categories together, have exceeded their quota in three out of the six categories. Dheevaras, with total 1.18 per cent representation in all the categories together, has exceeded its quota in two categories. The Latin Catholics, including Anglo-Indians, have a total of 3.14 per cent in all the categories together against their quota of 4 per cent. Scheduled Caste converts to Christianity have got a total representation of 0.78 per cent in all the categories together, which is short of their quota in all of them. 

Narendran Commission also pointed out that sixty-eight other communities grouped together by it have got a total representation of 7.46 per cent: In category I, their representation is 8.97 per cent against their quota of 6 per cent; In category II, their representation is 7.22 per cent against their quota of 3 per cent; In categories III, IV, V and VI, their representation is 6.48 per cent, 5.65 per cent, 6.88 per cent and 5.34 per cent respectively against their quota of 3 per cent. 

In PSUs as on August 1, 2001, the Commission also found that 54,984 out of 1,13,640 employees belonged to the backward classes (48.38 per cent against a quota of 40 per cent) and 41,863 to forward classes (36.84 per cent). At the same time, the percentages relating to universities showed a picture somewhat favoring the forward communities with 4,470 (45.86 per cent) employees belonging to the forward communities and 4,384 (44.98 per cent) belonging to the backward classes. The same situation prevails in autonomous institutions where the BCs together got 41.45 per cent of the 21,334 jobs against the forward communities cornering 51.09 per cent of the jobs.

In a nutshell, the Narendran Commission had pointed out that in Kerala's government service sector, the Muslim community deserved another 7,353 posts, Dheevaras 1,256, Nadars 2,614, Ezhavas 460, Latin Catholics 4,370 and Converted Christians 2,290. Since this was the position prevailing in 2000, all the BC bodies, with the Muslim organizations in the forefront, were demanding a special recruitment to fill up these backlog vacancies.