Reserved community member can avail of quota

A five-judge Constitution bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan, Justices S H Kapadia, R V Raveendran, B  Sudershan Reddy and P Sathasivam said, “The reserved category candidates belonging to OBC, SC/ ST categories who are selected on merit and placed in the list of General/Unreserved category candidates can opt to migrate to the respective reserved category at the time of allocation of services.’’

Setting aside the Madras High Court judgement which had declared the UPSC rule as unconstitutional, the bench said the option to take benefit of the quota after migrating to the reserved category was validly allowed by the recruiting commission.

In simple terms, the SC, ST and OBC candidates selected for IAS, IFS and central services under the general category are allowed to migrate to the reserved category to avail the benefits of reservation according to the rule.

The judgement assumes significance as it would have a bearing on the procedure for allotment of posts adopted by the UPSC as well as the aggrieved candidates who had challenged it in the Central Administrative Tribunal after the civil services examinations of 2005 and 2006-07.

The apex court, on August 27 last year, had reserved its judgement after a marathon hearing.