NEET-All India quota: highest court overturns Madras High Court order on EWS quota

A bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and BV Nagaratna said he was not setting aside the specific investigation on the merits, but for the reason that it did not fall within contempt jurisdiction.

The Supreme Court said that the precise direction of the HC judgment of August 25 “Was unnecessary for the purposes of the contempt plea”. “We therefore consider that the instruction issued … is foreign to the exercise of contempt jurisdiction,” he said.

The CH, which envisaged a petition filed by the decision of Tamil Nadu DMK – seeking contempt proceedings against the Center for allegedly failing to follow a July 2020 order – cited the 50 percent quota cap to rule that the 10 percent EWS quota authorization will carry the total reservation beyond 50 percent. “The additional reserve provided for economically weaker sections in the July 29, 2021 notification cannot be allowed except with the approval of the Supreme Court in this regard,” he said.

Aside from that, the highest court said that the HC having concluded that no contempt had been committed entered a broader spectrum than it should have. “We are of the opinion that HC has transgressed the limits of the contempt jurisdiction by entering areas which were unrelated to the problems raised by compliance with the previous order,” he said.

The court of first instance heard a plea from the Center against the management of HC.

The SC, which also supported petitions challenging the July 29 central notification allowing 27% of OBC quotas and 10% of EWS quotas in the All India quota, said it would consider the merits of the matter when hearing these petitions. Delivering an opinion on the petitions, she fixed October 7 to hear them.