It is high time the political class and lawmakers understood that governments, both State and Central, and State legislatures have no power to tinker with the list of Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) communities, and it is Parliament alone that can do so, the High Court of Karnataka has said.
Justice R. Devdas made these observations in a recent order dismissing petitions filed by H.R. Sumangala and others who had joined various public-sector banks during 1979-82 using caste certificates grouping them under ‘Rama Kshatriya’, a synonym for the ‘Kotegar’ community which is notified as a Scheduled Caste.
The petitioners moved the court in 2014-15 questioning the validity of show-cause notices issued to them by the bank managements based on a communication received from the Additional Director-General of Police of the Directorate of Civil Rights Enforcement (DCRE). He had, in 2014, asked the banks to dismiss those employees from service who had falsely claimed that ‘Rama Kshatriya’ fell under SC. Some of the petitioners retired from service during the pendency of the petition.
The court noted that the district caste verification committee, way back in 1998, had declined to validate their caste certificates but the banks did not take any action against them. The State government in 2003 issued a circular granting one-time amnesty to those who had secured jobs claiming that they fell under ‘Rama Kshatriya’ and some other castes that are synonyms to ‘Kotegar’. But the circular clarified that such persons would not get the benefit of reservation in future.
Based on this circular, the petitioners surrendered their caste certificates and secured job protection. However, the government in 2011 clarified that the benefit of the 2003 notification was applicable only to those employed by it and State undertakings, not employees of the Union government or Central undertakings.
‘Usurped power’
‘What is disturbing is that successive governments in the State have issued various circulars and government orders interfering or trying to usurp powers reserved for Parliament,” the court observed. It pointed out that the State government had issued the circular in 2003 despite failing before the High Court in 1995 on a similar circular issued in 1977, and also failing to persuade Parliament to include certain sub-castes/tribes as was directed by the court then.
“...whatever may be the intention behind such circulars, the fact is that more damage is caused than any benefit really flowing from such executive orders,” Justice Devdas observed while directing the banks and the DCRE to proceed further.
