HC strikes down Madhya Pradesh’s 27% OBC quota law, calls it ‘unconstitutional’

The Madhya Pradesh High Court on Friday struck down a 2019 State law that had increased reservation for the Other Backward Classes (OBC) category from 14% to 27%, holding that the government could not demonstrate any “extraordinary conditions or emergent situations” to breach the 50% ceiling on reservation.

A Division Bench of Justices Anand Pathak and Vinay Saraf in Jabalpur, in a 159-page order, termed the Madhya Pradesh Public Service (Reservation for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes) Amendment Act, 2019, brought during the 15-month Congress government of former Chief Minister Kamal Nath, as “unconstitutional”. It also directed the State recruitment authorities to fill the 13% posts, which have been on hold since September 2022 in all government jobs, with unreserved candidates within three months based on the already existing selection lists.

The High Court judgment came after years of hearing on a number of petitions filed by students from unreserved categories, who had challenged the Amendment Act of August 2019, which had followed an ordinance brought in by Mr. Nath’s government in March that year.

While the matter remained sub judice, various recruitment drives in the State faced court stays, prompting the State Government in September 2022, then run by the BJP, to come up with an 87:13 formula, which was approved by the High Court. This allowed recruitment on 87% of vacancies while putting the remaining 13% on hold till the matter was resolved. At present, two separate lists from the lower portion of the successful merit list - one of unreserved and one of OBC candidates - are prepared for the 13% posts and withheld, only to be released once the case is settled.