Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, Nov 7: A five-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court on Monday upheld the validity of the Constitution’s 103rd Amendment Act 2019, which provides for the 10 per cent EWS reservation amongst the general category.
The judgment was delivered by a bench comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) UU Lalit and Justices Dinesh Maheshwari, S Ravindra Bhat, Bela M Trivedi and JB Pardiwala.
There were four separate judgments delivered by the judges. Three out of five judges delivered verdicts in favour of the EWS quota, saying it did not violate the law.
Justice Dinesh Maheshwari held that EWS quota does not violate the basic structure of the Constitution.
Justice JB Pardiwala also upholds the validity of the Constitution's 103rd Amendment Act 2019, which provides for the 10 per cent EWS reservation amongst the general category.
— ANI (@ANI) November 7, 2022
“Reservation is an instrument of affirmative action by State so as to ensure all inclusive approach. It is an instrument not only for inclusion of socially and educationally backward classes…Reservations for EWS does not violate basic structure on account of 50% ceiling limit because ceiling limit is not inflexible,” the majority judgment by CJI Lalit and Justice Maheshwari said.
Justice Trivedi in her judgment said that the State has come out with amendment for advancement of EWS categories.
“The impugned amendment has to be treated as an affirmative action by the Parliament for the benefit of EWS class. It cannot be said to be unreasonable classification…Treating EWS as separate class would be a reasonable classification. Just as equals as unequals, unequals cannot be treated equally. Treating unequals equally violates equality under the Constitution…The amendment creates a separate class of EWS. The exclusion of SEBCs cannot be said as discriminatory or violative of Constitution.”
In his dissenting judgment however, Justice S Ravindra Bhat said that by excluding the poor among SC/ST/OBC from economically backward classes, the 103rd Amendment practices constitutionally prohibited forms of discrimination.
“Our constitution does not permit exclusion and this amendment undermines the fabric of social justice and thereby the basic structure. This amendment is deluding us to believe that those getting social and backward class benefit is somehow better placed. This court has held that 16(1) and (4) are facets of same equality principle. The characterization of excluding the poor of SEBCs is incorrect. What is described as benefits cannot be understood as free pass, it is a compensatory mechanism to reparate,” he said.
Justice Bhat also opined against breaching the 50% ceiling in matters of reservation.
He said, “Permitting breach of 50% would result in compartmentalisation. The rule of right to equality will become right to reservations taking us back to Champakam Dorairajan.”
Notably, the petitions challenged the constitutional validity of (103rd) Amendment Act 2019. Economic reservation in jobs and education was proposed to be provided by inserting clause (6) in Articles 15 and 16 of the Constitution through the amendment passed by the Parliament in January 2019.
The newly inserted Article 15(6) enabled the State to make special provisions for advancement of any economically weaker section of citizens, including reservations in educational institutions. It states that such reservation can be made in any educational institution, including private institutions, whether aided or unaided, except minority educational institutions covered under Article 30(1). It further states that the upper limit of the reservation will be ten percent, which will be in addition to the existing reservations. After the amendment was notified by the President, a batch of petitions were filed in the Supreme Court challenging the constitutional validity of economic reservation.
