August 27, 2020: A five-judge constitution bench of Supreme Court on Thursday observed that there can be sub classifications within scheduled castes (SCs) and scheduled tribes (STs) for granting them reservation; it disagreed with another Supreme Court verdict on the subject delivered in 2004.

In view of differences of opinion between two of the five judges of the constitution bench, the issue has been referred to the chief justice to constitute a larger bench to hear the case at length and adjudicate on the matter.

The bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra opined that since state governments have powers to make reservations, they also have the powers to make further sub-classifications in the reservation list.

Justice Mishra, while reading the operative parts of the judgment, said, “In a federal structure, the state government cannot be denied the power to make laws to give preferential treatment to sub-categories within the reservation list."

But the Supreme Court had in its judgement delivered in the EV Chinnaiah v the State of Andhra Pradesh case of 2005, held that it was unconstitutional for state legislatures to create sub categories of SCs and STs.

In the present case, the bench, also comprising Justices Indira Banerjee, Vineet Saran, MR Shah and Aniruddha Bose, had reserved its verdict on 17 August on the question whether the 2005 judgement needs to be revisited and on the constitutional validity of the laws made by the state legislatures for creating sub categories.

Thursday's judgement was passed on a batch of appeals against a Punjab and Haryana High court verdict which, while holding the provision to be unconstitutional, had struck down section 4(5) of the Punjab Scheduled Castes and Backward Classes (Reservation in Services) Act of 2006.

This section of the law had created a preference in favour of Balmiki and Mazhbi Sikhs from the 50% quota already reserved for the SC communities in case of direct recruitments.