SC will hear the PIL demanding a fair system of reservation in government jobs…

New Delh: The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to consider the PIL, which requested the Center to be directed to formulate policies for a more fair system of reservation in government jobs. A bench of Justice Suryakant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi has issued a notice to the Center on the public interest litigation of Ramashankar Prajapati and Yamuna Prasad and has sought a reply by October 10. After the Supreme Court agreed to hear the matter, a new debate may start on reservation in the country.

The bench also told the petitioner’s lawyer to be ready to face heavy opposition, as this PIL can have far-reaching effects. The petitioners, who have filed the PIL through advocate Sandeep Singh, have said that this approach will strengthen Articles 14, 15 and 16 of the Constitution and ensure equal opportunity without any tinkering with the existing reservation cap.

Deprived people left behind despite reservation
The petition states that despite reservation for decades, the most economically deprived are often left behind and the relatively better-off people from the reserved categories take advantage but giving priority on the basis of income will ensure that help starts where it is needed the most today. The PIL said, “The petitioners belonging to the Scheduled Caste (SC) and Other Backward Classes (OBC) categories, through the present petition, seek to highlight the economic inequalities within these communities, which have led to unequal distribution of benefits under the existing reservation policies.”

Many anomalies in the current system
The petition also argues that the reservation framework was initially introduced to uplift historically disadvantaged communities, but the current system disproportionately benefits people belonging to relatively prosperous economic strata and high social status backgrounds in these groups, while there is limited access to opportunities for the most economically disadvantaged members.

Now the time has come to take note of this…
Justice Kant said that many people from Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes (OBCs) can become socially and economically capable by entering higher categories of government jobs through reservation and provide the best education and facilities to their children. He said the time had come to consider whether such a class of people should continue to avail reservation benefits at the expense of members of their own community who are living in poverty and facing social problems.

What did Justice Gavai say last year?
The challenge of hearing the issue before a bench headed by Justice Kant would not be so difficult as the seven-judge bench judgment authored by Justice BR Gavai, the second member from the Dalit community to become the Chief Justice of India, on August 1 last year allowed states to sub-classify castes within the Scheduled Caste communities on the basis of socio-economic backwardness and low representation in government jobs to ensure that the bulk of the 15% reservation goes to the most backward classes. The court had then asked governments to formulate suitable criteria to prevent the ‘creamy layer’ of the Scheduled Castes from availing reservation benefits.