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While many state governments are looking to expand quotas beyond 50%, Orissa and Rajasthan High Courts have struck down such moves.Though the SC upheld the 10% reservation for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS), constitutional law expert Prof G Mohan Gopal argues that EWS judgment and increasing caste quotas should not be linked.Prof Gopal says more steps are needed to expand the scope of reservations to all levels and areas of employment.“Let’s put the issue in context. As forewarned by Dr. Ambedkar a century ago, power and wealth in India is still concentrated in an oligarchy of four small communities. What Dr Ambedkar proposed to dismantle the oligarchy was to directly link representation and reservation — by constantly increasing and reducing reservation as needed to ensure due and adequate representation of all communities without ceilings or floors. The current system of reservation has failed to secure a representative government. Removal of the judicially imposed 50% ceiling will not in and by itself secure representation. More is needed including a social census, linking reservations directly to representation and expanding the scope of reservations to all levels and areas of employment,” said Gopal, former National Judicial Academy director.While Congress said it will invoke the Ninth Schedule of the Constitution to increase the quota emulating the Tamil Nadu quota matrix, experts say the SC is yet to give a final verdict on TN quota at 69%. The Ninth Schedule contains a list of Central and state laws that cannot be challenged in courts.In 1993, the then Tamil Nadu CM passed a bill to maintain the state’s reservation at 69%. The bill later got the President’s nod. However, SC is yet to decide on the cases pending before it challenging the inclusion of the Act under the Ninth Schedule.
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Caste equation in Congress lexicon
