Nine-judge bench for SEBC quota if ’92 order needs relook: Supreme Court

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI: The Supreme Court on Friday said it may consider referring the Maratha quota case to a nine-judge bench if it comes to the conclusion that its 1992 verdict in the Indra Sawhney case fixing the ceiling of 50% reservation needed to be re-examined.
A bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan, L Nageswara Rao, S Abdul Nazeer, Hemant Gupta and S Ravindra Bhat said the court is bound by the Indra Sawhney judgement but it would consider whether that verdict should be revisited.The court allowed the parties to put forward their arguments for referring the case to larger bench as it was a nine-judge bench which delivered the landmark verdict almost three decades back.
Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the Maharashtra government, contended that there is already a judicial order passed last year to revisit the 1992 verdict. As the state government contended that hearing on important constitutional matters like validity of Maratha reservation must be done through physical hearing and not video-conferencing, the court deferred the hearing for March 8 and said there is likelihood of resumption of physical hearings by then. The court also fixed the timeline for hearings to wrap up the proceedings in a time-bound manner. The hearing will start from March 8 and conclude on March 18.
In a setback to the Maharashtra government, the SC had last year stayed implementation of quota for the Maratha community in government jobs and admission in educational institutions under Socially and Educationally Backward Classes Act and referred it to the Constitution bench to decide validity of the law.
Meanwhile, Ashok Chavan, chairman of the state cabinet sub-committee on Maratha quota, demanded that the Centre make a constitutional amendment in the ongoing Parliament session to protect Maratha reservation. The Maratha community will continue its protest at Pimpalgaon (Jalna) and other parts of the state till its reservation demand is met, said Vinod Patil, a convenor of Maratha Kranti Morcha.
Chavan, after the hearing in SC, said the Union government should give constitutional protection to the SEBC quota on the lines of the EWS quota.
— With inputs by Sujit Mahamulkar