The Bombay high court (HC) on Friday set aside an order of the Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal (MAT) which held that candidates from the Maratha community could not apply for government jobs in the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category.
Granting relief to Maratha candidates, a division bench of Justices Nitin M Jamdar and Manjusha A Deshpande said the tribunal deviated from established legal principles which led to “cascading effects.”
The court was hearing petitions filed by more than 100 candidates and the state government, challenging the MAT order of February 2023 which said that candidates from the Maratha community can not avail of EWS quota while applying for the posts of sub-inspector/tax assistant and clerk-typist, posts in the forest department and the engineering services, advertised in 2019.Further, the bench held that the EWS candidates had no vested rights to challenge the change in criteria, as the recruitment was still under way.The court passed the judgement on petitions of several aggrieved Maratha candidates who were unable to take advantage of the EWS quota in recruitments for the posts of sales tax sub-inspector, clerks, and posts in engineering and forest departments owing to a MAT order of February 2023. The order barred candidates who initially applied under the SEBC quota from being considered for positions in the EWS quota, even though they were qualified.In 2019, the Maharashtra government issued advertisements inviting applications for various posts under the MPSC. Under the recruitment process, around 16% of the posts were reserved for the Maratha community as per the SEBC Act, 2018.Later, in 2021, the Supreme Court of India struck down any reservation granted to the Maratha community as the total quota exceeded the 50% ceiling mandated by the court in the Indra Sawhney judgement. This meant that candidates who initially applied under the SEBC category were now considered under the open category, even though they might be qualified under the EWS quota.Considering the factum, the government, as a corrective measure, issued several resolutions in 2020 and 2021 allowing Maratha candidates to avail themselves of the EWS quota. Aggrieved by the government decision, several EWS candidates approached the MAT, seeking disqualification of SEBC candidates from any benefit of EWS quota. The court allowed the plea, leading to the present petition.
According to the state and the SEBC candidates, there was no illegality in the government resolution that allowed eligible SEBC candidates to avail themselves of the EWS quota as the procedural aspects of the recruitment were subject to change.However, according to the candidates under the EWS category, the tribunal was right in setting aside the government resolution as the posts for EWS and SEBC were notified separately. Moreover, once the recruitment process has commenced, altering the eligibility criteria is not allowed, they argued.
After hearing both sides, the court found merit in the arguments of the Maratha candidates. “The record would show that there were no changes made to the eligibility or qualification criteria for EWS candidates. The EWS candidates remained eligible, albeit competed with a widened competition pool”, the court said. The government was trying only to solve a one-time issue, the court said and struck down the MAT order
TAGS: Bombay High Court Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal Maratha community government jobs Economically Weaker Section (EWS) relief legal principles candidates division bench
