Kumar Bahukhandi
Supreme Court Justice Bela M. Trivedi, in dissenting verdict, says States can’t tinker with the SC list notified under Article 341 of Constitution
A seven-judge Bench of the Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud, in a majority judgement, overruled the E.V. Chinnaiah verdict, which had determined that State Legislatures cannot sub-classify Scheduled Castes for grant of reservation in admissions and public jobs.
States can identify the differing degrees of discrimination or backwardness and focus on greater benefits to sub-classes of Scheduled Castes. This would not violate the President’s exclusive authority under Article 341 to identify Scheduled Castes. The States’s power to sub-classify is subject to judicial review, it said.
The State’s power cannot be exercised on its mere whims. There should be empirical data, the top court said. The seven-judge Bench judgement also gave the green signal for the Tamil Nadu Assembly’s legislative competence to enact the Arunthathiyar Reservation Act.
Justice B.R. Gavai, in his separate opinion, noted the court, in this case, was dealing with the question of equality among unequals.
and scheduled tribes for grant of reservation in admissions and public jobs. | Photo Credit: Sushil Kumar Verma
A seven-judge Bench of the Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud, in a majority judgement, overruled the E.V. Chinnaiah verdict, which had determined that State Legislatures cannot sub-classify Scheduled Castes for grant of reservation in admissions and public jobs.
Chief Justice Chandrachud said Scheduled Castes are not an integrated or homogenous group.
States can identify the differing degrees of discrimination or backwardness and focus on greater benefits to sub-classes of Scheduled Castes. This would not violate the President’s exclusive authority under Article 341 to identify Scheduled Castes. The States’s power to sub-classify is subject to judicial review, it said.
gnal for the Tamil Nadu Assembly’s legislative competence to enact the Arunthathiyar Reservation Act.
Justice B.R. Gavai, in his separate opinion, noted the court, in this case, was dealing with the question of equality among unequals.
Continuing to give quota benefits to affluent backward classes defeats the very purpose of reservation. People who have reached a position of affluence riding on the benefits of reservation cannot be considered politically, economically and socially deprived anymore. They have already reached a stage where they should walk out of the provisions of reservation and give way to more deserving categories of SC/ST, he noted.
Justice Gavai said his view is that the State must evolve a policy for identifying the creamy layer even within the SC/ST in order to exclude them from the ambit of affirmative action.
“In my view, only this, and this alone, would help to reach real equality enshrined under the Constitution,” Justice Gavai read from his opinion.
