WB govt starts survey amid legal battle over HC order on OBC status

Kolkata: The West Bengal government has initiated a survey on Saturday to assess the economic conditions of the state’s other backward class (OBC) communities amid a legal battle over the Calcutta High Court’s 2024 order revoking the OBC status of 77 Muslim communities, officials aware of the developments said.

The Supreme Court is currently hearing the Trinamool Congress (TMC) government’s petition challenging the order passed by the division bench of justices --- Tapabrata Chakraborty and Rajasekhar Mantha --- in May last year, which triggered a huge political row on the eve of the Lok Sabha polls.

The Calcutta High Court in May 2024 scrapped OBC certificates awarded to 77 communities since 2010, an overwhelming majority of them Muslim, and called the classification process illegal.

The high court order, a copy of which was seen by HT, read, “This Court is of the view that the selection of 77 classes of Muslims as Backward is an affront to the Muslim community as a whole. This Court’s mind is not free from doubt that the said community has been treated as a commodity for political ends. This is clear from the chain of events that led to the classification of the 77 classes as OBCs and their inclusion to be treated as a vote bank.”

“The new survey is being conducted by the West Bengal Commission for Backward Classes. The backward classes welfare department is only assisting the commission,” a senior state government official told HT, requesting anonymity.

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He refused to share any further details. However, officials posted in various districts told HT that they have been instructed to begin the survey on Saturday and prepare reports on the economic and social background of those who received OBC certificates. “The orders came during virtual meetings held by senior bureaucrats,” a district official said.

He pointed out that the survey should not be confused with the caste census that the Congress and several partners in the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) coalition of opposition parties have demanded. “This is restricted to Bengal-based OBCs only,” he added.

Of the 77 OBC classified communities, 42 were earmarked for OBC status by the Left Front government in 2010, a year before the party was ousted by chief Mminister Mamata Banerjee’s TMC.

In the judgment, the court barred the state from appointing people from these 77 communities with immediate effect but said those who had joined service till then on the basis of OBC reservation would not be affected.

The TMC government has not held any staff selection examination since then.

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The high court order was passed after multiple hearings on petitions filed by three individuals and Atmadeep, a human rights organisation, between 2010 and 2020.

The petitioners alleged that reservations under both OBC-A (most backward) and OBC-B (backward) categories were awarded to many communities since 2011 without any evaluation of their economic status.

During the Supreme Court hearings, affidavits filed by the Bengal government last year revealed that several Muslim communities were granted OBC status on the same day they submitted their applications. Of the 108 communities included in the OBC (A and B combined) list in Bengal until 2010, 53 were Muslim.

The state’s Muslim population stood at 27.01% during the 2011 census and is projected to have increased to around 30% now.

After coming to power in 2011, Banerjee included more communities in the OBC lists in phases.

Till the high court passed its order in May 2024, there were 81 communities under OBC-A and 99 under OBC-B categories, according to the state backward classes welfare department. Of these, 56 Muslim communities were listed under OBC-A and 41 Muslim communities were listed under OBC-B.