The Madras High Court on Thursday directed Advocate-General Vijay Narayan to get instructions from the State government as to whether it is possible to provide reservations in higher education and public employment for the economically backward among the ‘forward caste’ (open competition) people.
Justice N. Kirubakaran also wanted to know the names of castes brought under Backward Class, Most Backward Class, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes lists and the year in which they were included. He further asked the government to spell out details of assessments, if any, carried out to find out the effect of reservations provided since 1950.
The interim order was passed on a batch of writ petitions filed by a group of students complaining about a majority of MBBS seats in government medical colleges across the State being allotted to reserved category students, much to the disadvantage of those falling under the open category.
During the course of arguments, the judge made it clear that he was not against reservations per se but was only concerned about meritorious students in ‘other castes/forward castes’ category not being able to secure medical seats despite scoring higher marks than their peers belonging to the reserved category.
“Think about the mindset of such students. Why should those students be made to suffer just because they were born in a particular community? It is not their fault. Why should these children be made to suffer because of mistakes committed by their ancestors,” the judge asked.
When the Advocate- General pointed out that the Supreme Court was already seized of the issue of reservations on the basis of social status with specific reference to Tamil Nadu, the judge asked him why shouldn’t the government examine the issue in detail, and find out how many caste groups had been uplifted due to reservations, notwithstanding the case pending in the apex court.
Fake certificate menace
Pointing out that not all of them who had been classified as ‘forward caste’ were well off, the judge said the government could also not lose sight of the fact that many of them were purchasing fake community certificates to claim themselves as BC, MBC and even SC categories. “Gaining admissions through such fake certificates defeats the object of providing reservations. Really deserving students from the reserved categories do not get seats,” the judge said.
