West Bengal Assembly Passes Bills To Restructure OBC Reservation, Removes 77 Communities From List Following 2024 Calcutta HC Verdict

The West Bengal Legislative Assembly on Monday passed two Bills overhauling the State's Other Backward Classes (OBC) reservation framework by removing 77 communities from the OBC list and restructuring the reservation regime in line with the directions issued by the Calcutta High Court in 2024.

The legislation amends both the West Bengal Backward Classes (Other than Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) (Reservation of Vacancies in Services and Posts) Act and the West Bengal Commission for Backward Classes Act, 1993, replacing the previous framework that had been struck down by the High Court.

The move follows the Calcutta High Court's judgment dated May 22, 2024, which had invalidated the inclusion of 77 communities—predominantly Muslim communities—added to the OBC list after 2010, holding that the process adopted by the then State Government was legally unsustainable. The High Court had also struck down the bifurcation of OBC reservations into Category A (10%) and Category B (7%), effectively limiting reservation to the 66 communities that had been recognised prior to 2010.

Interestingly, the High Court had also struck down the state government's attempt in 2025 to introduce a new list of OBC's, labelling it as an attempt to reintroduce scrapped reservations.

An SLP preferred by the West Bengal government before the Supreme Court on the issue remains pending.

What The Bills Provide

Introducing the Bills in the Assembly, Backward Classes Development Minister Gourishankar Ghosh said the amendments were intended to implement the High Court's judgment and restore the statutory role of the West Bengal Commission for Backward Classes.

According to the government, the revised framework retains only 66 communities that had been recognised after surveys conducted prior to 2010, while removing the 77 communities whose inclusion had been invalidated by the High Court. The State has also fixed OBC reservation at 7% in government services and posts, replacing the earlier 17% quota.

The amended law further empowers the Backward Classes Commission to undertake surveys, examine applications for inclusion or exclusion of communities and make recommendations to the State Government. It also introduces a statutory mechanism to object to over-inclusion or under-inclusion in the OBC list.

The Bills were passed after a division in the Assembly with 186 members voting in favour and 17 against, while several Opposition members staged a walkout.

Background

The legislation is a direct consequence of the Calcutta High Court's judgment in Amal Chandra Das v. State of West Bengal and connected matters, in which a Division Bench comprising Justices Tapabrata Chakraborty and Rajasekhar Mantha had declared illegal the inclusion of numerous communities in the State OBC list after finding that the State had failed to undertake the exercise mandated by law.

The High Court had held that religion appeared to have been the dominant factor in granting OBC status to several communities and observed that the reservation exercise could not be sustained merely on the basis of executive action without following the statutory procedure and recommendations of the Backward Classes Commission.

The Court consequently struck down the OBC status granted to the affected communities while protecting appointments that had already been made on the basis of the certificates. It also held unconstitutional the provision empowering the executive to alter the Schedule of backward classes without legislative scrutiny.

The State had subsequently challenged the High Court judgment before the Supreme Court, where the larger dispute over the methodology for identifying backward classes remains pending.