EWS reservation allowed but excluding SCs, STs & OBCs is to heap fresh injustice: SC

Quota should not continue for indefinite period to become vested interest

STATE TIMES NEWS

New Delhi: Introducing reservation for economically weaker sections in admissions and government jobs is permissible but excluding SCs, STs and OBCs as they enjoy pre-existing benefits is to heap fresh injustice, the Supreme Court said in its minority verdict on Monday, striking down the 103rd Constitution amendment.
While justices Dinesh Maheshwari, Bela M Trivedi and J B Pardiwala upheld the law, Justice S Ravindra Bhat along with Chief Justice U U Lalit shot down the same in their minority view. The judges, part of a five-judge constitution bench, read four separate judgments for over 35 minutes in the courtroom.
The Supreme Court by a majority view of 3:2 provided 10 per cent reservation to people belonging to the economically weaker sections (EWS) in admissions and government jobs, and said the quota does not violate the basic structure of the Constitution.
Justice Bhat, who authored a 100-page verdict for himself and Chief Justice Lalit, said the exclusionary clause operates in an utterly arbitrary manner as the exclusion operates against the socially disadvantaged classes and castes, absolutely, by confining them within their allocated reservation quotas.
The total and absolute exclusion of constitutionally recognised backward classes of citizens, and more acutely, Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) communities, is nothing but discrimination which reaches to the level of undermining and destroying the equality code and particularly, the principle of nondiscrimination, he said.
“Introducing the economic basis for reservation as a new criterion, is permissible. Yet, the ‘othering’ of socially and educationally disadvantaged classes including SCs/STs/OBCs by excluding them from this new reservation on the ground that they enjoy pre-existing benefits, is to heap fresh injustice based on past disability,” Justice Bhat said.
He, in the minority view, also said that the impugned amendment and the classification it creates, is arbitrary, and results in hostile discrimination of the poorest sections of society that are socially and educationally backward, and/or subjected to caste discrimination.
Chief Justice Lalit concurred with Justice Bhat view.
The bench headed by Chief Justice Lalit pronounced four separate verdicts on 40 petitions challenging the validity of the 103rd Constitution amendment promulgated by the Centre in 2019.
The top court heard as many as 40 petitions and most of the pleas, including the lead one filed by ‘Janhit Abhiyan’ in 2019, challenging the validity of the Constitution Amendment (103rd) Act, 2019.
Reservation should not continue for an indefinite period so as to become a “vested interest” and the vision of the framers of the Constitution that there should be a “time span” for such quotas has not been achieved, the Supreme Court said.
Justices Bela M Trivedi and J B Pardiwala, who wrote two separate and concurring views with Justice Dinesh Maheshwari in upholding the EWS quota, referred to the time span envisaged by the framers of the Constitution for having reservation in the country. Quoting B R Ambedkar, Justice Pardiwala said the idea of “Baba Saheb Ambedkar was to bring social harmony by introducing reservation for only 10 years. However, it has continued for the past seven decades. Reservation should not continue for an indefinite period of time so as to become a vested interest.”
Justice Trivedi, in her 24-page judgment, asked whether the country cannot move towards the ideal envisaged by the framers of the Constitution to have “an egalitarian, casteless and classless society”, and stressed that there is a need to revisit the system of reservation in the larger interest of the society as a whole, as a step forward towards transformative constitutionalism.
Though difficult, it is an achievable ideal, she said, adding, “Our Constitution, which is a living and organic document, continuously shapes the lives of citizens in particular and societies in general.”
“What was envisioned by the framers of the Constitution, what was proposed by the Constitution bench in 1985 and what was sought to be achieved on the completion of 50 years of the advent of the Constitution, that is, the policy of reservation must have a time span has still not been achieved even till this day, that is, till the completion of 75 years of our independence,” she said.
Justice Pardiwala, in his 117-page verdict, said reservation is not an end but a means — “a means to secure social and economic justice”.
“Reservation should not be allowed to become a vested interest. Real solution, however, lies in eliminating the causes that have led to the social, educational and economic backwardness of the weaker sections of the community,” he said.
The exercise to eliminate the causes started immediately after the country achieved independence and it still continues, Justice Pardiwala added.
“The longstanding development and the spread of education have resulted in tapering the gap between the classes to a considerable extent. As larger percentages of backward class members attain acceptable standards of education and employment, they should be removed from the backward categories so that attention can be paid toward those classes which genuinely need help,” he said.
In such circumstances, it is very much necessary to review the method of identification and the ways of determining backward classes, and also, to ascertain whether the criteria adopted or applied for the classification of backward classes is relevant in today’s conditions, Justice Pardiwala said. Justice Trivedi said it cannot be gainsaid that the age-old caste system in India was responsible for the origination of the reservation system in the country. The reservation system was introduced to correct the historical injustice faced by those belonging to the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes, and to provide them a level playing field to compete with those belonging to the forward classes, she said. “However, at the end of 75 years of our independence, we need to revisit the system of reservation in the larger interest of the society as a whole, as a step forward towards transformative constitutionalism,” Justice Trivedi said.