The administration stated on Wednesday that there are no plans to change the current reservation system, one month after the Supreme Court upheld the 10% EWS reservation in admissions and government posts.
Pratima Bhoumik, a minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment, made this statement in the Lok Sabha in response to a query about the Center's intentions to loosen the 50% cap on reservations in light of the Supreme Court's ruling and extend OBC reservations over 27%.
The Supreme Court ruled in a landmark decision on November 7 that the 10% reservation introduced in 2019 for EWS in admissions and government jobs, which excluded the poor from the Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST), and Other Backward Caste (OBC) categories, is not discriminatory and does not violate any fundamental principle of the Constitution.
The court dismissed petitions contesting the legality of the rule, saying that treating EWS as a separate category is a legitimate classification and that the Mandal judgment's 50% cap on the total reservation is "not rigid."