Karnataka High Court strikes down attempt to increase reservation for SCs/STs, declares it unconstitutional

The Karnataka High Court invalidated Sections 3 and 4 of the Karnataka Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Reservation Act, 2022. It declared both provisions ultra vires the Constitution, meaning they exceeded constitutional limits. The ruling directly removed the legal basis for the enhanced SC and ST quotas.

The provisions had increased SC reservation from 15% to 17% and ST reservation from 3% to 7%. With OBC reservation staying at 32%, the combined quota reached 56%. The Division Bench held that this breached the constitutionally binding 50% ceiling established by Supreme Court decisions.

The verdict followed petitions challenging the increased quota, including one concerning BBMP recruitment. The article does not specify how individual appointments or admissions will be processed after the ruling. It establishes, however, that the two provisions authorising the increase cannot stand.

Scheduled Castes, or SCs, are communities historically affected by caste-based exclusion and discrimination. Scheduled Tribes, or STs, are constitutionally recognised tribal communities that have faced long-standing social, economic, and educational disadvantage. These categories are identified under India’s constitutional and legal framework.

Reservation sets aside a share of seats in educational institutions and posts in government services. Its purpose is to improve representation and access for communities that have been excluded or disadvantaged. Karnataka’s law addressed both categories by proposing higher quotas for SCs and STs.

The article does not explain the constitutional definitions of SCs and STs or describe their social history in detail. It does show the central legal conflict: affirmative action must operate within constitutional limits. The High Court held that Karnataka’s increases crossed the binding 50% ceiling, despite the policy’s intended beneficiaries.

The law added two percentage points to the SC quota, moving it from 15% to 17%. It added four percentage points to the ST quota, increasing it from 3% to 7%. Together, these changes created a six-point increase in the State’s overall reservation.

The OBC quota remained unchanged at 32%. Before the law, SC, ST, and OBC reservations totalled 15% plus 3% plus 32%, or 50%. After the increases, the calculation became 17% plus 7% plus 32%, producing 56%.

The change was enacted through Karnataka’s 2022 reservation law, which operated retrospectively from November 1, 2022. The High Court held that the resulting 56% total breached the judicially established 50% ceiling. It therefore struck down the provisions authorising the higher SC and ST percentages.

The 50% reservation ceiling is a judicial limit on the State’s power to reserve seats and government posts. It reflects a constitutional balance: affirmative action should address disadvantage, but reservation should not eliminate the broader principle of equality of opportunity.

The Supreme Court laid down this ceiling in Indra Sawhney vs Union of India in 1992. The Karnataka High Court relied extensively on that decision and later Supreme Court rulings. It said the limit is not simply a cautious guideline or rule of prudence.

Instead, the High Court described the ceiling as a binding constitutional principle. It said the limit circumscribes the State’s power to provide reservation, regardless of the numerical strength of backward classes. Karnataka’s 56% total therefore exceeded the permitted boundary, leading the court to invalidate the relevant provisions.

The immediate legal result is that Sections 3 and 4, which authorised Karnataka’s higher SC and ST quotas, no longer survive the High Court’s ruling. The court found them constitutionally impermissible because they produced 56% total reservation, beyond the 50% ceiling.

The case included a challenge by civil engineering graduates to reservation in Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike recruitment. That shows the invalidated quota was being relied on in an actual recruitment process. The article also frames the law as covering educational seats and State service appointments.

However, the article does not state whether specific recruitment lists, appointments, admissions, or pending applications are cancelled, revised, or protected. Those details cannot be inferred from the judgment summary provided. The clear consequence described is narrower: the two provisions creating the increased quota have been struck down.

The State argued that the 103rd Constitutional Amendment, which introduced 10% reservation for Economically Weaker Sections, had removed the 50% rule. The High Court rejected that interpretation. Its reasoning preserved the ceiling for reservations benefiting backward classes.

According to the judgment, the EWS quota is carved out from the general merit pool. It is therefore treated differently from the SC, ST, and OBC quotas at issue in Karnataka. The existence of a separate EWS provision does not give the State unlimited power to expand backward-class reservation.

This distinction mattered because Karnataka’s law produced 56% total reservation after raising SC and ST quotas. The Bench held that the EWS amendment did not permit that increase. The article presents the ruling as reaffirming the 50% principle rather than explaining the amendment as abolishing it.

India’s constitutional framework recognises two connected goals. Equality of opportunity requires fair access to education and public employment. Affirmative action responds to historic disadvantage by reserving opportunities for communities that have been excluded or underrepresented.

The article illustrates this balance through Karnataka’s SC and ST quotas. The State increased SC reservation from 15% to 17% and ST reservation from 3% to 7%. But the OBC quota remained 32%, so the combined reservation became 56%. The High Court said the 50% ceiling protects the balance between the two principles.

The Bench therefore treated affirmative action as important but not unlimited. It held that the ceiling circumscribes the State’s power, regardless of backward classes’ numerical strength. The ruling struck down the increase while leaving the broader constitutional purpose of reservation intact, according to the framework described in the article.