Centre seeks vacation of stay on OBC reservations

The Centre today moved the Supreme Court seeking vacation of the stay on the implementation of the 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in elite educational institutions. It also sought setting up a five-member Constitution Bench to hear the matter.

Filing a "clarification" application a fortnight after the Supreme Court stayed the central law enabling reservation for OBCs, the government also opposed denial of reservations to the "creamy layer."

The government maintained that the decision of the nine-judge Constitution Bench in the Indra Sawhney case (Mandal case) upholding reservation for OBCs "is binding on all concerned, including the petitioners, the government as well as a two-member Bench of this honourable court."

Referring to the March 29 interim order of the two-judge Bench, the petition said that according to one view in the Union government, the judgement was only an advice to the government.

The alternative interpretation was that it was an order of stay of operation of Section 6 of the Central Educational Institutions (Reservation in Admissions) Act, the government said.

"It is respectively submitted that it would be in the interests of justice if the court were to clarify and confirm that the order dated March 29 is not an order directing stay of the implementation of the Act and is in the nature of advice to the Central government as to the course of action that may appropriately be undertaken," the application said.

Earlier in the day, Solicitor General GE Vahanvati's efforts to "mention" the matter before a Bench headed by Justice Arijit Pasayat did not fructify with the judge asking him to bring the matter before an appropriate Bench.

Justice Pasayat said he could mention the matter only when Justice LS Panta would sit with him.

However, hours after that, the Centre filed an application contending that the interim order on the issue was inconsistent with the nine-judge Bench judgment in the Mandal case. It maintained that the "census of 1931 never was the basis for identification of castes for inclusion in lists of socially and educationally backward classes/OBC."

Seeking vacation of the stay, the Centre said the order overlooked the "impact test" in relation to the vast section of the population which was suffering the stigma of backwardness and centuries of oppression.

CENTRESPEAK

The Supreme Court ruling in the Mandal case upholding reservation for OBCs "is binding on all.concerned, including...a two-member Bench of this honourable court."

The 1931 Census was used only for the limited purpose of deriving the proportion of socially and educationally backward classes and OBCs

The court stay overlooks the "impact test" in relation to the vast number of people who don't have access to education