Revisting the Reservation for Economically Weaker Sections
The Supreme Court is slated to hear the petitions against the 103rd constitutional amendment act which provided for the10 per cent reservation for economically weaker sections.
103rd Constitutional Amendment Act
The Act amends Articles 15 and 16 of the Constitution, and grants government the power to provide for reservation in appointments to posts under the state and in admissions to educational institutions to “economically weaker sections of citizens.
The quota will be applicable only to citizens other than the classes that are already eligible for reservation. Hence persons belonging to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and persons who are not part of the creamy layer of the Other Backward Classes will not be eligible to the seats available under the quota.
Plea before the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court will look into the question whether the amendment infringes the idea of equality which is intrinsic to the Constitution and will examine whether departing from it will somehow breach the document’s basic structure.
Arguments of the Petitioners
The petitioners argue that:
- The reservation based on individual economic status violates the Constitution’s basic structure.
- Petitioners argue that providing for affirmative action unmindful of the structural inequalities inherent in India’s society overthrows the prevailing rationale for reservations.
- The amendment destroys the Constitution’s ideal of equal opportunity.
Constitutional Rationale for Reservations
The reading of the constituent assembly debates show that:
- The constitution-makers saw reservations as a promise against prejudice, as a tool to assimilate deprived groups into public life, and as a means of reparation, to compensate persons belonging to those groups for the reprehensible acts of discrimination wrought on them through history.
- The constitution-makers envisioned that by providing for a more proportionate distribution of the share in administration, the programme of reservations would end at least some of caste-based domination of jobs, particularly of employment in the public sector — a domination that was built over thousands of years, where Dalits and Adivasis were denied access to equal status.
The Supreme Court will now examine the constitutional validity of the 103rd constitutional amendment act which provides the reservation solely based on an economic criterion.
