The first bench, comprising Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy, noted that the issue had to be examined. The bench said, “The essential submission on behalf of the writ petitioners is that even if a reservation is extended to economically weaker sections, the economics of the extent of weakness has to be worked out. The petitioners are aggrieved that a general class is made out of students attending government schools without making any endeavour to ascertain the economic condition of the families of the students.”

The bench refused to grant an immediate order sought on this basis. It said, “Since the process has progressed substantially any disruption by way of an interim order may not be in public interest. Exceptions can later be carved out for worthy candidates, if the relevant writ petitions are allowed.”

Based on this, the bench directed the State to file counter within a fortnight and sought it to disclose the report on which the govt enactment was founded. The HC posted the case for hearing to January 27. While most pleas challenged the 7.5% per se, one of it sought extension of the same to students of Government aided schools.