The Supreme Court on Thursday decided to examine on July 14 a plea to stay the Maharashtra government’s decision to provide 10 per cent reservation to members of the Maratha community, that constitutes about one-third of the state’s population, in jobs and education in breach of the 50 per cent ceiling imposed by a nine-judge constitution bench.

A bench of Justices K.V. Viswanathan and N. Kotiswar Singh passed the direction on a plea for “urgent hearing” by a lawyer representing one of the petitioners who have challenged the constitutional validity of the Maharashtra State Reservation for Socially and Educationally Backward Classes Act. It provides a 10 per cent quota to the Maratha community under the OBC category.

This is the second round of litigation on the reservation for the Marathas, as a five-judge constitution bench had in 2021 quashed the 16 per cent quota to the community in breach of a nine-judge bench ruling of 1992 that reservation benefits should not exceed the 50 per cent ceiling.

The lawyer complained that the petitioner was forced to approach the top court as Bombay High Court had declined to grant any interim stay on the enforcement of the Act, which is likely to take effect from July 18.

According to the counsel, though a three-judge bench of Bombay High Court was seized of the matter relating to the challenge posed by the batch of petitioners, it had declined to grant an interim stay on the new legislation.

During the hearing of the petitions, the high court had made it clear that any quota benefits extended in jobs and education under the 2024 Act would be subject to the outcome of the challenge to the constitutionality of the legislation.

Aggrieved by the high court’s refusal to grant an interim stay, the petitioner has approached the Supreme Court.