Centre mulls review plea, amendment on SC/ST promotion

New Delhi: Caught on the backfoot over the Supreme Court’s SC/ ST reservation order, the Centre is mulling filing a review petition while simultaneously considering an amendment bill to declare all Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes “backward” to pave the way for their reservation in promotion.

The government’s eagerness to mitigate the fallout of the SC ruling can be gauged from the fact that home minister Amit Shah took charge of the situation by holding meetings with social justice minister Thaawar Chand Gehlot and law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad to discuss the options before the government. The issue was also taken up by the Prime Minister’s Office, which is closely studying the assessments by stakeholder ministries, including the DoPT.

Through the amendment the government could remove Article 16 (4A), introduced in the Constitution through the 77th Amendment, which provides for reservation in promotion if the state feels SC/ST aren’t adequately represented.

According to ministry sources, the government would replace this and declare all SCs and STs as “backward”, which would settle the question of backwardness for all castes included as SCs and STs and would not leave it to the discretion of the state governments.

In the event of the appeal to SC not succeeding, the government can further amend the Constitution to make it mandatory for providing reservation, the ministries seem to have suggested.

Article 16 (4) and Article 16 (4A) represent the spirit of the nation to provide reservation to the backward sections, top government sources said.