Jabalpur: The Madhya Pradesh High Court has struck down the 2019 legislation that increased the reservation for Other Backward Classes in the state from 14 percent to 27 percent, declaring the measure unconstitutional. As a result of the ruling, the OBC quota has officially been returned to 14 percent.
In a detailed 159-page verdict, a division bench consisting of Justices Anand Pathak and Vinay Saraf instructed recruitment agencies to fill, within a three-month timeframe, the 13 percent of government positions that had been withheld following initial legal challenges against the law. The court specified that these vacancies must now be drawn from the unreserved category.
Advocate General Prashant Singh, representing the state administration, stated that the judgment followed a thorough review of submitted records, data compilations, and tables. He clarified that the legal dispute centered strictly on the 2019 expansion of OBC quotas in public employment and education rather than the foundational principle of reservations for backward groups.
According to the Advocate General, the bench determined that no extraordinary conditions existed to warrant breaching the 50 percent threshold for total reservations, citing established legal precedents from previous Supreme Court rulings. State recruitment bodies, including the Madhya Pradesh Public Service Commission and the Employees Selection Board, were instructed to execute the directives regarding the disputed posts within the stipulated three months.
The expanded quota was originally introduced by the Congress administration led by then-Chief Minister Kamal Nath, who implemented the change through an ordinance in March 2019 before it gained formal legislative approval later that year. The policy faced immediate legal opposition in the high court, and the controversy eventually reached the Supreme Court before being remanded back to the Madhya Pradesh High Court for a consolidated hearing. The bench concluded hearings on the batch of petitions in August 2026 before reserving its judgment.
Political fallout from the decision was swift, with state Congress president Jitu Patwari vowing that his party would persist in its efforts to secure a 27 percent quota for the community. He blamed the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party government and Chief Minister Mohan Yadav for the outcome, confirming plans to appeal the high court ruling before the Supreme Court.
Representatives from the OBC Mahasabha also voiced dissatisfaction with the outcome. Lokendra Gurjar, a national core committee member and petitioner in the case, announced that the group would pursue an appeal in the apex court and organize statewide protests to safeguard the interests of backward classes.
Meanwhile, former Madhya Pradesh State Backward Classes Commission chairman J P Dhanopia criticized the state administration, claiming the verdict stemmed from governmental inaction and a failure to present a robust defense of the policy before the judiciary. With the legal framework for the 2019 expansion now overturned, state agencies must move forward with filling the long-pending vacancies while stakeholders prepare for another round of legal battles at the national level.