SC approves OBC quota in MP local body polls
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday permitted Madhya Pradesh to provide reservation to Other Backward Classes (OBC) in local body elections for now, modifying an earlier order that suspended the quotas last year due to a lack of data. The move is especially significant because this is the first time a state has met the court-mandated requirements for providing reservation for OBCS in local elections.
The order passed by a bench of justices AM Khanwilkar, AS Oka and CT Ravikumar directed the state to notify the OBC seats, accepting a report of the threemember OBC commission formed by Madhya Pradesh in September last year. This commission quantified the population of OBCS in the state at 48% and permitted reservation of varying quantum across each municipal seat, extending to a maximum of 35%.
“For the time being, we permit the Madhya Pradesh State Election Commission to notify the election programme for the respective local bodies keeping in mind the delimitation notifications already issued by the state government as on this date, i.e., till today; and also the reports submitted by the dedicated commission, referred to above,” the bench said.
Stating that no further time should be lost in filling up local bodies overdue for election, the bench permitted the Madhya Pradesh government to notify the reservation pattern local body wise as delineated in the latest report of the commission submitted on May 12. “That be done within one week from today,” the top court said.
Once this exercise is completed, the court directed the MP state poll body to notify the election for nearly 23,263 local bodies within one week thereafter. The court clarified that it had not decided on the merits of the commission’s report and had only allowed the state to rely on the commission’s findings for permitting the reservation.
Currently, local bodies in Madhya Pradesh have quotas only for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and women.
This is the first time that a state government has managed to clear the triple test formula mandated by the apex court in the context of providing reservation for OBCS in local body polls. Last year, the top court scrapped OBC quotas in local body polls in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, and the Odisha
high court nixed a similar move in the state — because the exercise didn’t pass the triple test.
The triple-test formula, laid down by the Supreme Court in a 2010 Constitution bench decision and later reiterated in March last year, required the states to appoint a commission, collect quantifiable data of the community, and allocate reservation to them in local bodies in such a manner that the total reservation in each seat does not exceed 50%.
Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan called it a “historic day” for the state and claimed that his government took all possible measures to ensure quota for the community.
“Today is a historic day. I am satisfied with the Supreme Court’s decision to conduct the (local bodies) elections by permitting the OBC reservation. Now, elections will be held with the quota for the community,” he told reporters in Bhopal.