50 Percent Reservation in Judicial Services

The Bihar Cabinet declared 50 per cent reservation in all judicial services for persons belonging to the Extremely Backward Classes, Other Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.

The reservation will be in both Superior Judicial Services and Subordinate Judicial Services.

According to decision, aspirants belonging to EBCs will get 21 per cent reservation, OBCs will have 12 per cent reservations, Scheduled Castes will have 16 per cent reservation and Scheduled Tribes will be provided 1 per cent reservation in all judicial services of the State.

In all categories, there will be 35 per cent ‘horizontal reservation’ for women and 1 per cent reservation for disabled persons.

Background:

In view of the Supreme Court order in the State of Bihar versus Dayanand Singh case (September 29, 2016), and after the approval of the Bihar Public Service Commission, the government has taken this decision.

Earlier in October, a Division Bench comprising Justice J. Chelameswar and Justice Abhay Manohar Sapre of the Supreme Court had asked the Bihar government and Patna High Court to complete the exercise of providing reservations to backward classes in State’s judicial services by January 1, 2017, and that the process of filling up vacancies in the judicial services by June 30, 2017.

The apex court has also ordered the appointment of those backward class candidates whose appointments were withheld after the Patna High Court quashed the State government’s decision to provide reservation in judicial services.