Supreme Court rejects Centre's review against scrapping quota for Jats

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court today dismissed the plea of the Centre seeking a review of its March 17 verdict that set aside a notification to include Jats in the central list of Other Backward Classes (OBC) category in 9 states to accord quota benefits to them.

A bench, headed by Justice Ranjana Gogoi, in the in-chamber proceedings, decided to reject the pleas filed by Jats' bodies, saying that they lacked merit.

The Centre had moved the apex court on April 2 seeking a review of its verdict after Prime Minister Narendra Modi had met Jat community leaders and assured them of finding a solution within the legal framework.

In its review plea, it had said that the Centre's power to make available quota for a community is not dependent on the advice of National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC).

While dismissing a petition by a group of Jat students seeking benefits of reservation under OBC category in post-graduate medical and dental courses two days ago, the apex court, however, had said NCBC's recommendations would be ordinarily binding on the government.

The government's plea had further said the test laid down by the apex court in the Mandal judgement for determination of "social, educational and economic backwardness" of Jats had been complied with.

The decision to include Jats in Central OBC list was taken after various state panels furnished reports favouring the inclusion, it had said.

Earlier, a bench of justices Ranjan Gogoi and RF Nariman, setting aside the March 4, 2014 notification that had enabled Jats to claim reservation in nine states, had said that "possible wrong inclusions" cannot be the basis of further inclusion and reservation should be given only to the "most distressed".