‘Government can add, delete communities in SEBC quota’

MUMBAI: The Socially and Economically Backward Class (SEBC) Act stipulates reservation to a backward community for a temporary period and other communities could also be added to or deleted from the SEBC category if the government deems it so, said petitioners supporting the reservation for Marathas on Friday. Petitioners were responding to the queries of the Bombay high court (HC) as to why only Marathas were given reservation under the SEBC act.

On November 30 last year, the Maharashtra Legislature passed a bill proposing 16% reservation in education and government jobs for Marathas.

The division bench of justices Ranjit More and Bharati Dangre had directed senior advocate Rafiq Dada, who was appearing for petitioner Avijith Kadam, to respond as to why the Marathas had been granted separate reservation as they were also considered as a backward class. The court also asked the petitioner what were the exceptional circumstances that justified the government’s decision to grant the community reservation.

Dada, while referring to the Indra Sawhney judgement of 1992, informed the court that the judgements ruled that states could exceed the 50% cap on reservation in exceptional circumstances. He said the Gaikwad Commission had, in its 2018 report, concluded that Marathas were inadequately represented in public services and educational institutions. Therefore,it deemed it necessary to grant them reservation. Dada said the commission had also recommended that Marathas should be given reservation without disturbing the existing reservations and hence a separate category of SEBC was carved out.