Parental income alone cannot determine OBC creamy layer status, says Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Wednesday held that parental income alone cannot be used to determine whether a candidate falls in the creamy layer of the Other Backward Classes category, Live Law reported.

A bench of Justices PS Narasimha and R Mahadevan dismissed appeals filed by the Union government and upheld rulings of the Madras, Delhi and Kerala High Courts, The Indian Express reported.

The case involved candidates who had cleared the civil services examination conducted by the Union Public Service Commission but were denied Other Backward Classes benefits because their parents’ salaries exceeded the creamy layer income threshold. Many of the parents worked in public sector undertakings, banks or private organisations.

The creamy layer refers to the wealthier and more advanced members within a group that is eligible for affirmative action benefits.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday said that whether a person is part of the creamy layer must be determined primarily by the status and category of the posts held by the parents, not income alone.

Referring to the government’s 1993 office memorandum issued after the ruling in the Indira Sawhney versus Union of India case, the court noted that income from salary and agricultural sources was not meant to be clubbed with the income from other sources while applying the income or wealth test.

The bench said that interpreting the rules in a way that disadvantages one section of the same backward class without justification would amount to “equals being treated unequally,” Live Law reported.

It also held that relying only on a 2004 government clarification to treat salary income as the determining factor was “legally unsustainable”, according to the legal news portal.

The court dismissed the Union government’s appeals and directed the authorities to reconsider the candidates’ claims under the correct criteria within six months.