SC secures quota seats for OBCs

Other Backward Classes students now have a better shot at getting into central education institutions such as the Delhi University and the Jawaharlal Nehru University. Bhadra Sinha reports.

Other Backward Classes students now have a better shot at getting into central education institutions such as the Delhi University and the Jawaharlal Nehru University.

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The Supreme Court Thursday said the cut-offs for OBC students in these institutions would be independent of those for the general category students.

A constitution bench ruled in 2008 that the cut-off marks for OBC candidates be 10% lower than those for the general category candidates. It led to many OBC seats remaining vacant and being reverted to general category.

Thursday's judgment delinks the OBC and general category cut-offs. Clarifying the 2008 order, a two-judge bench said the cut-off marks in the order meant eligibility marks.

“Where minimum eligibility marks in the qualifying examinations are prescribed for admission, say 50% for general category candidates, the minimum eligibility marks for OBCs should not be less than 45%,” a bench of justice RV Raveendran and justice AK Patnaik said.

The court, however, said an institute could fix the minimum eligibility marks for OBCs anywhere between 45% and 50%.

Two students from JNU had approached the Delhi high court, complaining that the way the university was implementing the 2008 order was leaving OBC seats vacant.

The HC declared that the universities could only fix eligibility criteria for admission in the reserved category at maximum 10% below the criteria for the general category. The SC upheld the verdict.

With regard to admission in the current session (2011-12), the court said if an institution had drawn the cut-offs for OBCs according to the earlier formula and reverted vacant seats to general category, such admissions shall not be disturbed. But where the process was incomplete, the OBC seats would be filled only by OBC candidates.

An OBC seat can go to a general category candidate only if no OBC candidate has minimum eligibility/qualifying marks.

The SC, however, didn't say anything on Should an OBC candidate make it through the open merit list, will the student be counted against the general seat or the OBC one? The SC left the question unanswered.