The Supreme Court held that the status of the cream of other backward classes (OBCs) cannot be determined on the basis of parental income alone and that treating children of public sector undertakings (PSUs) and private sector employees differently from children of government employees for the purpose of eligibility for reservation amounts to hostile discrimination.
“Determining the status of the creamy layer on the basis of income groups alone, without reference to the categories of contributions and parameters of status, is clearly unsustainable in law,” Times of India quoted the Supreme Court bench as saying.
Justices PS Narasimha and R Mahadevan reportedly delivered the judgment while upholding the judgments of the Madras, Kerala and Delhi High Courts, each examining the eligibility of candidates seeking OBC (Non-Creamy Layer) benefits in civil services examinations.
Several of these high court orders ruled in favor of candidates who claimed that they were wrongly placed in the creamy layer purely because their parents were employed in PSUs, banks or the private sector.
The court was categorical in its reasoning and held that “the object of the exclusion of the creamy layer is to ensure that the socially advanced sections within the OBCs do not appropriate benefits meant for the truly backward; it is not to create artificial differences between equally situated members of the same social class”. Indian Express report quoted.
(This is a developing story. Please check back for more updates)
