Justice Bela Trivedi’s dissenting judgment on scheduled castes classification

In her dissenting judgment, Justice Bela Trivedi ruled that state legislatures have "neither executive nor legislative power to sub-classify or sub-divide or re-group the castes, races or tribes specified as the Scheduled Castes".

Justice Trivedi held that "the action of the state though well-intentioned and affirmative in nature, if it violates the specific provision of the Constitution, cannot be validated by the Supreme Court".

Her judgment states that "the removal of inequalities or remedy to remove inequalities cannot be permitted at the cost of violation of the specific provision of the Constitution".


She added "only Parliament...can include in or exclude from the list of the Scheduled Castes". The judgment adds "the etymological and evolutionary history and the background of the nomenclature 'Scheduled Castes', coupled with the Presidential orders published under Article 341 of the Constitution, make the 'Scheduled Castes', a homogenous class, which cannot be tinkered with by the states."

She held "states have no legislative competence to enact law for providing reservation or giving preferential treatment to a particular caste/castes by dividing/sub-dividing/sub-classifying or regrouping the castes, races or tribes enumerated as the Scheduled Castes".