Stay Only On OBC Quota Hearing, Not Implementation: Supreme Court

Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): The Supreme Court, while hearing transferred petitions on Thursday, clarified that the stay order is on the Madhya Pradesh High Court's hearing of cases and not on the implementation of the state's 27% OBC reservation law.

Justices Abhay S. Oka and Ujjwal Bhuyan were informed that the Madhya Pradesh government had filed transfer petitions in all the cases, while more than two dozen cases were withdrawn from the High Court.

Out of 75 transfer petitions filed by the Advocate General, hearings were held on 69, and 17 of those were dismissed. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta represented the state government during the proceedings.

Senior advocate Rameshwar Thakur, appearing on behalf of the OBC petitioners, said that “like in Chhattisgarh, all pending recruitments in Madhya Pradesh should be conducted on 100% posts until a final decision is made on the petitions”.

However, the court pointed out that it had stayed the High Court hearings, not the implementation of the reservation law itself. “The Supreme Court's comments made it clear that the 27% OBC reservation law had not been stayed by either the High Court or the Supreme Court. Despite this, the Madhya Pradesh government has not implemented the law, misleading the OBC community by citing pendency of the cases as a reason for the delay”, Thakur said.