SC refuses to stay Patna HC order on Bihar's 65% quota

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay a Patna high court order setting aside the amended reservation laws in Bihar that enabled the Nitish Kumar government to raise quotas for Dalits, tribals and backward classes from 50 per cent to 65 per cent.

A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud, Justice J B Pardiwala and Justice Manoj Misra, however, agreed to hear 10 petitions of the Bihar government against the Patna high court verdict.

The top court, which did not even issue notices on the pleas, admitted the appeals for hearing and said the petitions would be listed in September.

Appearing for the state government, senior advocate Shyam Divan urged the bench to stay the high court order. He referred to a similar case of Chhattisgarh and said the top court had stayed the order of the high court in that case.

Besides seeking a stay, Divan also sought the issuance of notices to the respondents, who had moved the high court against the enhanced quota limit.

"We will list the matter, but we will not grant any stay (on the HC verdict)... No interim relief granted at the present stage," the CJI said, without issuing the notices on the pleas.

Earlier, the state government had moved the top court against the judgment. 

In its June 20 verdict, the high court declared that the amendments, passed unanimously by the state's bicameral legislature in November last year, were "ultra vires" of the Constitution, "bad in law" and "violative of the equality clause".

A division bench of the high court had allowed a bunch of petitions challenging the Bihar Reservation of Vacancies in Posts and Services (for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes) (Amendment) Act, 2023 and the Bihar (in admission in educational institutions) Reservation (Amendment) Act, 2023, while "leaving the parties to suffer their respective costs".

In a detailed judgment running into 87 pages, the high court had made it clear that it saw "no extenuating circumstance enabling the state to breach" the 50-per cent cap on reservations laid down by the Supreme Court in the Indra Sawhney case.

"The state proceeded on the mere proportion of the population of different categories as against their numerical representation in government services and educational institutions," the high court had pointed out.

The amendments had followed a caste survey, which put the percentage of Other Backward Classes (OBC) and Extremely Backward Classes (EBC) at a staggering 63 per cent of the state's total population, while the SCs and STs were stated to have accounted for more than 21 per cent.

The exercise was undertaken by the Bihar government after the Centre expressed its inability to carry out a fresh headcount of castes other than the SCs and STs, which was last held as part of the 1931 census.