M. R. Balaji And Others v. State of Mysore.

AIR 1963 SC 649

Jurisdiction: Supreme Court
5 Bench judgement
Gajendragadkar, P.B. ,Bhuvneshwar P. (CJ), Wanchoo,
K.N. Gupta, K.C. Das, Shah, J.C.
Date of judgement: 28 September ; 1962
INTROCUCTION
After the enactment of the first Constitutional Amendment in
1951 , Balaji was the first case which came up before the
Supreme Court.
An order of Mysore Government issued under Art. 15(4)
reserved seat for admission to the state medical and
engineering colleges for Backward classes. This was in
addition to the reservation of seats for the Scheduled castes
(15%) and for the Scheduled Tribes (3%) Backward and more
Backward classes were designated on the basis of castes and
communities where Backward classes (28%) , more Backward
classes (20%) total consisted (68%) and for merit pool only
(32%) was made available. The validity was challenged by
candidates who had secured more marks than those
admitted under the order. Though qualified on merit they
had failed to get admission only be the reason of the
government order. So the petitioner filed a suit on High Court
but the court remain same judgement given to the previous
petitioner on the basis commission made for determining the
backward class. So the petitioner did not satisfied with the
the judgement and move to the apex Supreme Court. The
court held that the sub classification made by the order
between “backward classes” and “more backward classes”
was not justified under Article 15(4). Though caste may be a
relevant factor but it cannot be the sole test for ascertaining
whether a particular class is a backward class or not. Poverty,
occupation, place of habitation may all be the relevant
factors to be taken into consideration.

FACTS
An order Mysore government issued under Article 15(4)
reserved seats for admission to the state medical and
engineering colleges. On July 26, 1958 the state issued an
order that all the communities excepting the Brahmin
community, fell within the classes of educationally and
socially backward classes and Scheduled castes and
scheduled tribes 75% seats reserved for them. Similar order
issued on May 14, 1959 , June 9,1960 , July 10,1961 , but all
of them were aside when challenged. But on July 31, 1962
state of Mysore passed another order which superseded all
the previous orders and left only 32% seats for the merit
pool. This order was challenged by 23 petitioners by writ
peitition under Article 32. The petitioner said that the
classification made by the state was irrational and
reservation of 68% was fraud on Article 15(4) of the
Constitution. Petitioner filed the case on High Court for this
and the earlier
ISSUE
1. Does the exclusion of students from the educational
institution on the basis unreasonable reservation criteria
which violates Article 15(4) of Indian Constitution?

2. Whether the state has authority to make reservation on

the basis of caste as “Backward” and “More Backward”?

DECISION
The court declared the order bad on several grounds.
The first defect in the Mysore order was it was based
solely on caste without the regard to other relevant
factors and this was not permissible under Art. 15(4).
Though caste in relation to Hindus could be a relevant
factor to consider in determining the social
backwardness of a class of citizens, it must not be
made the sole and dominant test in behalf. Christians,
Jains and Muslims do not believe in the caste system
and therefore the test of caste could not be applied to
them. In as much as identifications of all backward
classes under the impugned order had been made
solely on the basis of caste, the order was bad. “Social
backwardness is in the ultimate analysis the result of
poverty to the large extent”.
The test adopted by the state to measure educational
backwardness was the basis of the average of student
population in the last three high school classes of all
the high schools in the State in relation to a thousand
citizens of that community. This average of all the state
6.9 per thousand. The court stated that assuming that
the test applied was rational and permissible to judge
educational backwardness, it was not validity applied.
Only a community well below the State average could
properly regarded as backward, but not a community
which came near the average. The vice of Mysore
order was that it included in the list of backward
classes, castes, or communities whose average was
slightly above, or very near , or just below the state
average e.g., Lingayats with an average of 7.1 per cent
were mentioned in the list of backward communities.
The Art. 15(4) does not envisage classification between
“backward” and “more backward classes” as was made
by the Mysore order. Art. 15(4) authorises special
provisions being made for really backward classes and
not for such classes as were less advanced than the
most advanced classes in the State. By adopting the
technique of classifying communities into backward
and more backward classes, 90 per cent of the total
population had been treated as backward. The order,
in effect, sought to divide the State population into the
most advanced and the rest, and the latter into two
categories – backward and more backward – and the
classification of the two categories was not envisaged
by Art. 15(4). The interests of weaker sections of the
society which are a first charge on the State and the
Centre have to be adjusted with the interests of the
community as a whole. The adjustments of these
competing claims undoubtedly a difficult matter, but if
under the guise of making a special provision a State
reserves practically all the seats available in the
colleges, that clearly would be subverting the object of
Art. (4). The state has “to approach its tasks objectively
and in a rational manner”.
The Supreme Court could sense the danger in treating
caste as the sole criterion for determining social and
educational backwardness. The importance of the
judgement lies in realistically appraising the situations
when the court said that economic backwardness
would provide a much more reliable yardstick for
determining social backwardness because more often
educational backwardness is the outcome of social
backwardness. The court drew distinction between
caste and class. An attempt at finding a new basis for
ascertaining social and educational backwardness in
place of caste is reflected.
The court also ruled that reservation under Art. 15(4)
should be reasonable. It should not be such as to
defeat or nullify the main rule of equality enshrined in
Art. 15(1). While it would not be possible to predict the
exact permissible percentage of reservation it can be
stated in a general and broad way that it ought to be
less than 50% and it would depend upon the relevant
prevailing circumstances in each case. Also a provision
under Art. 15(4) need not be in the form of a law, it
could as well be made by an executive order.
In this case, SC held the following:
1. Reservation cannot be more than 50 per cent.
2. The classification of backward and more backward
is invalid.
3. Caste cannot be the only criteria because art. 15(4)
talks about class and class is not synonymous with
caste. So other factor such as poverty should be
considered.
 REASONING
The appellant court placed great weight upon the
division of backward classes which is not justified in
Art. 15(4), and in substance is a fraud on the power
conferred by the State. The petitioners pray the writ
of mandamus or direction issued against respondent
and the two selection committees which have been
impleaded as respondents and the order was passed
under Art. 15(4) was not valid because the basis
adopted by the order in specifying and enumerating
the socially and educationally backward classes of
citizens in the State is unintelligible and irrational,
and the classification made on the said basis is in
consistent with and outside the provision of Art.
15(4).
These allegation was denied by the State and it was
urged on its behalf that the classification made is
both rational and intelligible and the reservation
prescribed by the order is fully justified by the Art.
15(4).
The order was made on by four other orders, so it is
necessary to understand the background of the
dispute between the parties. In the case of
Ramakrishna Singh v. State of Mysore A.I.R 1960
Mysore 338. In this case the State had appointed a
committee named Mysore backward class
committee headed by Dr. R. Nagan, to investigate
the problem and to give advise the government for
the criteria which should be adopted to determining
the eductionalliy and socially backward classes. In
this committee made 40 per cent for reservation
pool and 60 per cent left for merit pool. This order
was challenged in the case of S. A. Partha v. The
State of Mysore A.I.R 1961 Mysore 220, In this the
court does not satisfies and the question raise 22 per
cent reserved seats for the Backward Classes would
result during competition lead unreasonable
restraint on the fundamental rights of the other
citizens. Then the Nagan Gowda Committee has
come to the conclusion that caste and communities
is the only method to determining the backward
class and the committee sub divided into “backward”
and “more backward”.
The committee sent the report and said that seats
for reservation of backward classes should extent to
70 per cent. The Central Government did not
satisfied with the approach of determining the
backward classes. The government said that caste
system is the great hindrance of our progress as
egalitarian society. Instructions issued by the Central
government to the state requesting them to render
every possible assistance and to give all reasonable
facilities to the people who came in category of
backward classes accordance with their existing list.
From these cases and the petitioner case which
supersedes all the previous order made by the state
and the petitioner involves the consideration of
sociological and economic factor needed to be
attached in determining the backward classes.
The Central government wrote to Secretary of
Education Department of the Government of Mysore
on the subject of reservation of under Art. 15(4) that
government should follow uniform policy to
determining the backward classes where 50 per cent
for merit pool and 50 per cent for reservation.
In the case of Champakam Doirairajan v. State of
Madras AIR 1951 SC 226, The judgement led to the
first amendment of the Constitution of India
regarding reservation. The Supreme Court upheld
the judgement of the Madras High Court and says
caste based reservation in government jobs and
college seats and providing such reservation was in
violation of Art. 16(2) of the Indian Constitution.
 COMMENT
I think cast plays a role in the social superiority and
inferiority of people, however castes may not be an
entirely irrelevant consideration to determine whether
a group is a backward class of the citizen. The use of
caste as the sole or even paramount consideration in
determining became impermissible.

REFERENCE
1. WWW. Indiankanoon.COM