In a major setback to the Yogi Adityanath government, the Allahabad High Court on Monday stayed its decision to include 17 Other Backward Classes (OBC) in the Scheduled Castes (SC) list.
The court’s decision came on a petition filed by social activist Gorakh Prasad.
On June 24, the State government had directed District Magistrates and Commissioners to issue Scheduled Caste certificates to 17 OBCs — Kashyap, Rajbhar, Dhivar, Bind, Kumhar, Kahar, Kewat, Nishad, Bhar, Mallah, Prajapati, Dhimar, Batham, Turha, Godia, Manjhi and Machua.
The government’s move was apparently aimed at wooing these communities ahead of by-elections to 12 Assembly seats.
The decision, incidentally, had been criticised even by the BJP-led Central government, with Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Thawar Chand Gehlot telling the Rajya Sabha on July 2 that the move was not in accordance with the Constitution.
Mr. Gehlot had said that if the U.P. government wanted to go ahead with its proposal, it should follow procedure and send a proposal to the Centre.
BSP chief Mayawati had also slammed the move as “unconstitutional” and called it “politically motivated”.
“These castes will no longer get benefits of quota under the OBC category. They will be treated as general castes. It is clear that Yogi government has issued this order to deceive these castes,” Ms. Mayawati had said.
SP’s 2005 attempt
The BJP government in Uttar Pradesh is not the first to move the 17 OBCs to the SC list. In 2005, the then Mulayam Singh Yadav government passed the first order to include 11 of these castes in the SC list but the order was stayed and the proposal sent to the Centre.
Subsequently, the BSP government of Mayawati quashed the notification.