Admission of OBC candidates to post-graduate courses in IIMs and IITs can now resume. The Supreme Court on Friday vacated a stay order of the Calcutta High Court on implementation of the 27 per cent OBC quota in central educational institutions.
A bench headed by Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan also stayed all proceedings pending in the HCs in Kolkata, Delhi and Mumbai on petitions filed by anti-quota groups and individuals.
Terming the Calcutta HC’s interim order on Wednesday as “strange”, the bench said: “No court can sit over a Supreme Court judgment… We cannot allow the Calcutta High Court order to operate.” It emphasised that SC had already upheld the validity of the quota law, so there was no question of a stay.
The court also issued notices to Youth for Equality, Pan-IIM Alumni Association and Sayan Guha, on whose petitions proceedings were initiated in the HCs. They were asked to respond to the Centre’s petition seeking transfer of the cases pending in the three HCs.
The court did not agree with the argument of anti-quota groups that graduates should be treated as creamy layer, which was excluded by the five-judge Constitution bench that upheld the quota law on April 10.
{{/usCountry}}The court did not agree with the argument of anti-quota groups that graduates should be treated as creamy layer, which was excluded by the five-judge Constitution bench that upheld the quota law on April 10.
{{/usCountry}}Lawyers of the anti-quota groups pointed out that three judges in the Constitution bench had held that a graduate couldn’t be said to be educationally backward.
The court, however, said that admissions under OBC quota would be subject to the final outcome of the proceedings before the court.