The Union government on Thursday submitted before the Supreme Court that despite the Other Backward Castes (OBC) population being more in numbers, reservation was kept at 27 per cent due to the cap of 50 per cent set by the apex court.

Appearing before the five-judge constitutional bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan, Solicitor General G E Vahanvati said: “'The government earmarked 27 per cent reservation for the OBCs as the apex court has fixed a cap of 50 per cent”.

Concluding his arguments, Mr Vahanvati said according to the Mandal Commission report, the reservation should be 27 per cent.

According to a national survey conducted between July, 2004 and June, 2005, the percentage of OBCs is 41, Scheduled Caste (SC) 15 and Scheduled Tribe(ST) 8.

Justifying the reservation of 27 per cent for the OBC candidates in the higher educational institutes, the government said the figure was not exaggerated and infringing on the percentage of other forward caste communities.

Tamil Nadu, which supports the reservation along with the government, would put forth its arguments form Tuesday.

The Centre also said that there could be no time frame for providing reservation to the backward communities in the higher educational institutions or government jobs.

“'This is not the time to set time limit,” said Mr Vahanvati during the submission.

The policy of reservation has been framed by Parliament and it would itself review it to ascertain the advances made and grounds achieved in a periodic manner, the government said.

“The fact that the Supreme Court, in the Indira Sawhney case, has held caste to be the determining factor for assessing backwardness, has now put beyond any controversy by the Constitution bench in the Nagaraj case,” said the 96 page petition which was filed in reply to the arguments of the anti-reservationists.

The court has been hearing the issues pertaining to the constitutional validity of the 93rd amendment, the provision of Central Educational Institutions (Reservation in Admission) Act 2006, providing 27 per cent reservation for Other Backward Communities (OBCs) and Union government’s power on implementing such policy without any basis.