The Supreme Court on Wednesday reversed the findings in M Nagraj judgement which stated that the states required to collect quantifiable data to prove backwardness and also said its 2006 decision in the case on the reservation for Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes (SC/ST) in job promotions does not require reconsideration by a larger bench.
In August this year, A five-judge bench of the apex court comprising of Justices R F Nariman, Kurian Joseph, S K Kaul and Indu Malhotra had reserved its verdict on petitions seeking a seven-bench examination in the M Nagaraj case that had put conditions for job promotions to SC/ST employees working in the public sector.
In the Nagaraj Judgement, earlier the Supreme Court had held that there was no compulsion on the state to provide reservation in promotions to SCs/STs. But if any state wished to give promotion, it was required to collect quantifiable data to prove the backwardness, the state was also required to ensure that the reservation does not breach the 50 per cent ceiling.
The Centre and various state governments had sought reconsideration of the 12-year-old verdict on various grounds. Appearing for the centre Attorney General K K Venugopal, had sought reconsideration of the Nagaraj verdict, saying it was not implementable.
Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra at the time of reserving its verdict in the case had noted that no state had prepared the “quantifiable data” despite such a direction in the Nagaraj case.
