Supreme Court allows Maharashtra to hold local body polls, with a rider
A bench headed by justice Surya Kant passed the order since elections to the local bodies have been stuck due to the top court’s status quo order of August 2022
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed local body elections in Maharashtra, held up on account of challenge to reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBC) since 2022, to be notified and held within four months. The top court said the outcome of the elections would be subject to the court’s final decision on the pending challenge to the state law extending 27% reservation for OBC in local body polls.
A bench headed by justice Surya Kant passed the order since elections to the local bodies have been stuck due to the top court’s status quo order of August 2022. Some of these local bodies have not had elections at panchayat and gram sabha levels for the last five years.
In an interim direction passed in the matter, the bench, also comprising justice N Kotiswar Singh said, “In our opinion, the constitutional mandate of grassroot democracy through periodical election of local bodies ought to be respected and ensured since elected bodies have a prescribed term and no irreversible damage will be caused.”
It directed the Maharashtra State Election Commission to notify the local body polls within four weeks. On the contentious issue of OBC reservation, the order said, “The reservation will be provided to the OBC community as existed in the state prior to the Bainthia Commission report.”
To be sure, the Supreme Court in March 2021 directed that no state can implement OBC reservation in local bodies without following the triple test.
A 2010 constitution bench verdict laid down a triple test for reserving seats in local body polls: Setting up a dedicated commission to conduct contemporaneous rigorous empirical inquiry into the nature and implications of the backwardness with respect to local bodies, specifying the proportion of reservation in light of the commission’s proposals, and not exceeding the 50% quota cap as laid down by the top court in a landmark 1992 judgment.
The Maharashtra government, in compliance with the triple test, set up a committee headed by former chief secretary Jayant Banthia who recommended 27% OBC reservation in the state’s local bodies. However, the committee’s recommendations came to be separately challenged in a set of petitions filed in the top court on the ground that it failed to provide empirical data.
On Tuesday, the top court said that OBC reservation in local bodies can be rolled out on the condition that “the result and outcome of the elections will be subject to outcome of these proceedings.”
The bench further directed the State Election Commission to conclude the elections within four months. The commission can approach the court to seek an extension in appropriate cases.
The court acknowledged that challenges to the Banthia Committee report would be considered along with other related questions of law arising in these proceedings. However, the same cannot be allowed to stall the holding of elections in local bodies. “Elected bodies have prescribed tenure....We see no reason that elections should not be held in Maharashtra subject to outcome of these proceedings,” the bench said.
