Slug: Supreme Court warns no civic polls can proceed above 50% quota; NMC forced to redraw ward map and prepare fresh lottery
The election process for the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) has been pushed into sudden turmoil after the Supreme Court reiterated that no local body election can proceed if caste-based reservations cross the 50% ceiling. A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi delivered the warning on Monday, asserting that any matrix exceeding the limit “cannot survive in law.” Acting on Solicitor General Tushar Mehta’s request, the bench has scheduled the decisive hearing for November 19, a date that will determine the future of NMC’s election schedule.
NMC’s recently announced ward reservation list had allocated 82 of 151 seats to reserved categories—well above the permissible 75.5 seats. If the Supreme Court refuses to dilute its position, the civic body will be compelled to remove seven OBC-reserved seats. All 40 OBC wards will enter a public lottery, from which seven will be eliminated, reducing the OBC tally to 33 seats—about 21.85% of the total House. This marks a steep drop from the 41 OBC seats allotted under the 27% quota during the 2017 polls.
SC and ST reservations will remain untouched as they are constitutionally protected under Articles 243D and 243T, leaving only OBC wards vulnerable to deletion. Officials explain that removing an OBC (Women) seat converts it to General (Women), while deleting an OBC (Open) seat turns it into General (Open), potentially increasing General-category seats across the city.
The shake-up stems from the Supreme Court’s Vikas Gawali (2021) ruling, which made the Triple Test mandatory and the 50% cap absolute—rendering NMC’s 82-seat reservation structure untenable and forcing an immediate overhaul of its ward matrix.
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