The Supreme Court has restored the other backward class (OBC) reservation in the local body polls in Maharashtra, clearing the cloud of uncertainty surrounding it. The top court accepted the report of the dedicated commission that prepared empirical data and completed a triple test the court had ordered 15 months ago. The SC on Wednesday asked the State Election Commission to notify the pending elections within two weeks.

The quota has been capped at 27 per cent, the old cut-off, but it could decrease in the local bodies where the OBCs’ population is less than 34 per cent, the figure the commission led by former chief secretary JK Banthia has arrived at. The matter had come up for the then MVA government’s attention on December 13, 2019, when the excessive OBC quota in five districts was challenged. The SC stayed the quota and asked to hold elections without it. It asked the state government to complete a triple test. The state’s brief was to form a dedicated commission to conduct an empirical inquiry into the nature and implications of the OBCs’ backwardness; to specify the proportion of reservation required to be provisioned as per the Commission’s recommendations and in any case not exceed the aggregate of 50 per cent of the total seats reserved in favour of SCs/STs/OBCs taken together.