Priya Gour
Published on: August 31, 2022 at 18:38 IST
The Supreme Court Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, AS Oka and Vikram Nath has called for Centre’s response, regarding extension of reservation benefits to Scheduled Caste community or Dalits, converted to other faiths.
In 2020, the Supreme Court had issued notice in a PIL filed by an organization named National Council of Dalit Christians (NCDC) seeking a direction to grant Scheduled Castes (SC) status to Dalit Christians. Another petition was filed almost 18 years ago. All concerned parties have to submit their response by 11th October, 2022.
Justice Kaul noted, “I find it exasperating that no one files pleadings on time. Then, the whole schedule gets away.’
The National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities, under CJI Ranganath Misra in its 2007 report had found merit for granting Scheduled Caste status to Dalit Christians.
Advocate Prashant Bhushan ,counsel for the petitioner NGO CPIL highlighted importance of the Report. He also pointed out that the general apprehension being wrong. That Dalit Christians with quality education access by Christian educational institutions would benefit from most of the reserved seats.
And so the method of reservation as per the population of the respective community, suggested by the NCSC could be taken into consideration.
To this, the court said that such “reservation within reservation” has to checked for its constitutionality. Justice Kaul said:
“… In the OBC category it has been done but whether it can be done in the SC category will be another question of law.”
The Solicitor General, Mr. Tushar Mehta questioned of such benefits to be availed even after conversion. And it is uncertain whether the reservation would be needed after conversion or not.
The bench asked about the time when was the affidavit for non-acceptance of the commission’s report filed? The centre sought time to look into the matter.
The court has directed the Central Government to file its affidavit within a period of 3 weeks.