New Delhi, Read: The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to hear a plea seeking mandatory change of constituencies reserved for Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) in Parliament and state legislatures on a rotational basis. The court said that such decisions come under the jurisdiction of the legislature and courts cannot give orders in this regard.
A bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V. Mohana refused to interfere with the Allahabad High Court judgment which had upheld Section 9(1)(c) of the Limitation Act, 2002. This provision pertains to identifying reserved constituencies in areas where the proportion of SC/ST population is comparatively higher. Petitioner Jagdish Singh is a voter of 191-Kadipur assembly constituency in Sultanpur district of Uttar Pradesh. He had challenged the continuous reservation of this constituency for the Scheduled Castes. He claimed that this seat has been reserved for almost seven decades since its formation. He argued that there being no system of rotation in reservation violates Articles 14, 15 and 19 of the Constitution. This also limits the electoral options of the voters, as they can choose their representatives only from among the Scheduled Caste candidates.
The petition claimed that the current system is benefiting a limited number of political families instead of furthering the interests of the broader community. The petition sought to create a mechanism similar to the system of rotation of reservation in Panchayats and Municipalities under Articles 243D and 243T of the Constitution. In this, the bench was requested to give instructions to make changes in the constituencies reserved for SC/ST from time to time.
During the hearing, Justice Bagchi said that in a multi-party democracy, voters are expected to make electoral choices on the basis of political ideologies rather than caste or religion. Justice Bagchi said, “In a political democracy there are many political parties with different ideologies. Voters are expected to vote based on political party rather than religion. You may like or dislike a particular political ideology. It becomes irrelevant who is representing that ideology. You vote for that ideology. Therefore, this also refutes your argument.