Sub-classification Inside a Reserved Class

In one line

A State may now give preference to the most disadvantaged castes within the Scheduled Castes, which for twenty years it could not.

In the wording a student can write in an exam: in E.V. Chinnaiah v. State of Andhra Pradesh a Constitution Bench of five held that the castes in the Presidential List under article 341 form a HOMOGENEOUS GROUP which a State may not re-group for the purposes of reservation, that to do so would amount to discrimination in reverse and attract article 14, and that only Parliament may include or exclude a caste from the List under article 341(2). In State of Punjab v. Davinder Singh, decided on 1 August 2024, seven judges held that sub-classification within the Scheduled Castes IS constitutionally permissible and OVERRULED Chinnaiah: article 341 creates a DEEMING FICTION whose only consequence is that the listed castes receive the benefits the Constitution provides, and it does not create an integrated homogeneous class; sub-classification does not violate article 341(2) because no caste is thereby included in or excluded from the List; and the State may sub-classify under articles 15(4) and 16(4) if there is a RATIONAL PRINCIPLE OF DIFFERENTIATION with a NEXUS to the purpose.

The provisions

Article 341(1). The President may, with respect to any State or Union territory, and where it is a State after consultation with the Governor, BY PUBLIC NOTIFICATION specify the castes, races or tribes, or parts of or groups within castes, races or tribes, which shall for the purposes of the Constitution be deemed to be Scheduled Castes in relation to that State or Union territory.

Article 341(2). PARLIAMENT may by law include in or exclude from the list any caste, race or tribe or part of or group within any caste, race or tribe, but save as so provided a notification issued under clause (1) shall NOT BE VARIED BY ANY SUBSEQUENT NOTIFICATION.

Article 342 does the same for the Scheduled Tribes.

The question the two cases answer. Given a single list for a State, may that State treat the castes on the list differently among themselves when distributing the benefit of a reservation? Or is the list a single class which must be treated as one?

The position from 1962 to 2004

On the Other Backward Classes, sub-classification was permitted. Indra Sawhney v. Union of India held that there is NO CONSTITUTIONAL BAR to classifying backward classes into BACKWARD AND MORE BACKWARD. That reversed the view M.R. Balaji v. State of Mysore had taken in 1962 on the material before it.

But on the Scheduled Castes the answer went the other way. In E.V. Chinnaiah v. State of Andhra Pradesh, (2005) 1 SCC 394; AIR 2005 SC 162, decided on 5 November 2004 by a Constitution Bench of five: Santosh Hegde, Variava, B.P. Singh, Sema and S.B. Sinha JJ. Facts. Accepting the report of the Justice Ramachandra Raju Commission, Andhra Pradesh divided the fifty-seven castes in the Presidential List of Scheduled Castes into four groups by inter se backwardness and apportioned the State's fifteen per cent reservation among them as one, seven, six and one per cent. Held. The apportionment was STRUCK DOWN. The castes in the Presidential List under article 341 form a HOMOGENEOUS GROUP which a State may not re-group for the purposes of reservation and appointments; to do so would amount to DISCRIMINATION IN REVERSE and attract article 14; and only Parliament may include or exclude a caste from the List under article 341(2). "Justice to one group at the cost of injustice to another is another way of perpetuating injustice."