OBC reservation in local body elections: Supreme Court to take up Uttar Pradesh plea on Wednesday

The Supreme Court will hear the petition filed by the government of Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday, the state government had moved apex court challenging the Allahabad High Court decision on civic body elections in the state.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, on behalf of the UP government, mentioned the matter before the Apex Court today, seeking listing of the matter on Tuesday.

The Court however said that it will hear the matter on Wednesday. The High Court had ruled that the notification for OBC reservation in the civic polls failed the triple test set by the Supreme Court. The High Court had directed that elections be held immediately without reservation for OBCs.

The State Government informed the Apex Court that they had already constituted the OBC commission, in such a situation, the local body elections should only be conducted after the report of the commission.

The petition stated that the UP government has urged to stay the decision of the High Court, to approve the conduct of elections only after the report of the commission.

The Uttar Pradesh government on last Wednesday constituted a Backward Classes Commission in the state.

An official statement issued by the UP government mentioned the the commission, shall be chaired by retired Judge Ram Avtar Singh.

The statement also said that on the basis of the commission’s report, the backward class reservation will be decided for UP’s municipal body elections.

Former IAS officers CS Verma and Mahendra Kumar, along with former legal advisor Santosh Kumar Vishwakarma and former additional legal advisor and additional district judge Brijesh Kumar Soni will be the members of the commission.

The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court ordered the government for conducting urban body elections in UP without implementing the OBC quota.

As per this, there shall be a rapid survey of backward classes to be conducted by the state government in every municipal body.

Since 1991, all the elections to municipal bodies (1995, 2000, 2006, 2012 and 2017) have been conducted on the basis of these provisions given in the Act and the report of the Rapid Survey.