SC quashes Centre's decision to include Jats in OBC quota

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday struck down the Centre’s controversial decision to grant reservation to the Jat community in jobs and educational institutions while terming it a reflection of “negative” and “retrograde” governance.
The UPA government’s decision to grant OBC status to the Jat community on the eve of the 2014 general elections had drawn strong reactions from other backward class communities which viewed the move as vote bank politics.The NDA government had defended the UPA’s decision in the Supreme Court.
“We cannot agree with the view taken by the government that Jats in the nine states in question are a backward community so as to be entitled to inclusion in the central lists of other backward classes,” the SC said.
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“The view taken by the National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC) to the contrary is adequately supported by good and acceptable reasons which furnished a sound and reasonable basis for further consequential action on the part of the Union government,” said Justice Gogoi, who authored the judgment for the bench, which also included Justice Rohinton F Nariman.
NCBC had in its report advised the government against grant of OBC status to Jats, saying the community was not socially and educationally backward to be entitled to a share in 27% OBC quota in jobs and admission to educational institutions. It had also said the community was adequately represented in armed forces, government services and educational institutions.
On March 4 last year, the Centre had granted OBC status to Jats of Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand besides the districts of Bharatpur and Dholpur in Rajasthan. It had rejected the NCBC’s suggestions, saying it “did not adequately take into account the ground realities”.
The court also rejected the Centre’s stand justifying reservation on the ground that Jats were granted OBC status by many states 10 years ago. It pulled up the government for reopening the issue on the basis of outdated and antiquated data a decade later during which the country had progressed.
“The necessary data on which the exercise has to be made has to be contemporaneous. Outdated statistics cannot provide accurate parameters for measuring backwardness for the purpose of inclusion in the list of other backward classes. This is because one may legitimately presume progressive advancement of all citizens on every front, i.e. social, economic and education,” the bench said.
“Any other view would amount to retrograde governance. Yet, surprisingly, the facts that stare at us indicate a governmental affirmation of such negative governance inasmuch as decade-old decisions not to treat the Jats as backward, arrived at on due consideration of the existing ground realities, have been reopened, inspite of perceptible all round development of the nation,” it added.
The court also said the government decision was primarily based on educational backwardness while the earlier apex court order had categorically held that backwardness contemplated by Article 16(4) was social backwardness.
It said the advice tendered by NCBC was ordinarily binding on the government and it could be “overruled/ignored only for strong and compelling reasons which would be expected to be available in writing”.