The Supreme Court recently rejected the review petitions filed against its August 1 judgment which upheld the power of States to sub-classify reserved category groups, that is, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (SC/STs), into different groups based on their inter se backwardness for extending the benefits of reservation [Thumati Ravi v. State of Punjab and Others].
A seven-judge Constitution Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud with Justices BR Gavai, Vikram Nath, Bela M Trivedi, Pankaj Mithal, Manoj Misra, and Satish Chandra Sharma was of the view that no case for review was made out by the petitioners.
"Permission to file the review petitions granted. Applications for listing the review petitions in open Court are rejected. Delay condoned. Having perused the review petitions, there is no error apparent on the face of the record. No case for review under Order XLVII Rule 1 of the Supreme Court Rules 2013 has been established. The review petitions are, therefore, dismissed," the Court said in its order dated September 24.
On August 1, the Constitution Bench had overruled the 2005 judgment of EV Chinnaiah v. State of Andhra Pradesh which had held that sub-classification of SC/STs is contrary to Article 341 of the Constitution which empowers the President to prepare the list of SC/STs.
"The members of SC/ST are not often able to climb up the ladder due to the systemic discrimination faced. Article 14 permits sub-classification of caste. Court must check if a class is homogeneous or and a class not integrated for a purpose can be further classified," the Constitution Bench had said in its majority judgment.
The Court added that historical evidence and social parameters clearly showed that all SC/STs do not constitute a homogenous class.
Thus, sub-classification of SC/STs by States will not fall foul of Article 341, the majority on the Bench had ruled.
Justice Bela Trivedi dissented from the majority and ruled that such sub-classification is not permissible.
Notably, the majority also clarified that when a State does sub-classify SC/STs, the same has to be backed up by empirical data and should not be based on whims or to meet political ends. The Court proceeded to overrule the EV Chinnaiah judgment.
Pertinently, four of the seven judges on the Bench - Justices BR Gavai, Vikram Nath, Pankaj Mithal and Satish Chandra Sharma - had also called for the identification of the creamy layer among the SC/ST category to take them out of the fold of reservation.
In conclusion, the majority on the Bench had upheld the validity of laws enabling sub-classification of SC/ST communities in Punjab, Tamil Nadu and other States.
This led to the review petitions before the apex court which have now been dismissed.
With respect to Punjab, the matter concerned the validity of the Punjab Scheduled Caste and Backward Classes (Reservation in Services) Act, 2006, which involved the sub-classification of reserved category communities.
This law was struck down by the Punjab and Haryana High Court, leading to an appeal by the Punjab government before the top court.
The laws were challenged on the basis of the 2005 Constitution Bench judgment in EV Chinnaiah v. State of Andhra Pradesh which had held that sub-classification of SCs is contrary to Article 341 of the Constitution.
The judgment in Chinnaiah said that all SCs form a homogenous class and cannot be sub-divided.
The matter was eventually referred to a seven-judge bench of the top court in 2020, after a five-judge Bench disagreed with the decision rendered in the EV Chinnaiah case.
The Central government defended reservation for downtrodden classes in India, while informing that it is in favour of having sub-classification.
The States said that sub-classification of SC/STs does not violate Article 341 since it does not tinker with the list prepared by the President.
Article 341 merely deals with the preparation of a list of SCs, the States argued. The scope of the Article ends there and it does not prevent States from sub-classifying SCs based on their backwardness to extend reservation benefits, they added.
[Read Order]