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A Karnataka High Court bench of Chief Justice Rituraj Awasthi and Justice Sachin Magdum has junked the State’s preliminary objections in plea challenging the State’s creation of caste based corporations.

The plea challenges the issue of whether the creation of selective caste based corporations and spending huge public money in any manner for this purpose violates secularism as enshrined in the constitution.

The plea also questioned on whether State has legal sanction to create such corporations which are allegedly "caste based". The plea urges the court to consider whether spending public money for development of few castes would be violative of Article 27 of Constitution of India.

Prabhuling Navadgi, the Advocate General of Karnataka, submitted that that the petitioners have not impleaded all the corporations which they have alleged to have been constituted on caste basis. He submitted that the petitioners have chosen to implead only a few corporations and that all the government orders issued for creation of such corporations have not been challenged.

The Advocate General argued that these corporations are nothing but agencies who implement budgetary allocation for the development of the people belonging to the caste and unless Karnataka Appropriation act is called in, the constitution of these corporation cannot be challenged.

The Advocate General further raised an objection is with respect to t the delay in filing of the WP. He submitted that these corporations have been in existence for the las 10-11 years and the Writ Petition was filed in 2020. The Advocate General further questioned the bonafide of the petitioners to raise these questions.

The AG relied on judgments of Bhim Singh Vs UOI, in order to assert that the question of allocation of budget and the withdrawal of funds from the consolidated fund on the basis of the appropriation act cannot be questioned and it is in the domain of the government.

The AG submitted that the caste has been the basis to determine the backwardness of particular communities and it has been upheld by Supreme Court in Indra Sawhney. It is submitted that all these corporation which are under challenge are basically corporations for development of backward classes of the society for which the constitution already envisages reservation.

Vija Shankar, Senior Advocate, appearing  for Karnataka Aravasya Development Corporation  supported the preliminary objections raised by AG, he submitted that under entry 32 of the Constitution, State is empowered to created corporations on the basis of caste. He further submitted that all these corporation have been u/s 8 companies act,2013 which itself envisages registration of companies for upliftment of any religion.

In reply to the preliminary objections of the State, Mr. Ravivarma Kumar, Senior Advocate, submitted that the act of State creating these corporations on the basis of caste is arbitrary and is based on political considerations. He submitted that as per the documents placed on record by State more than 500 Backward, 101 SC and 50 ST have been notified in Karnataka. Whereas the State has created corporations only for few castes such as Maratha, Veera Saiva, Lingayat, Arya Vaish and Brahmin.

He submitted that this goes to show the discrimination. He submitted that the petitioners have not challenged the Karnataka Appropriation act as it does not allocate any funds for these corporations. He further submitted that the apex court in the case of Sabarimala has itself conceded as to whether caste and religion can be treated to be one or not. He argued that the  Supreme Court has held caste, community and social status do not bring into being a religious denomination.

It was further submitted that the petitioner while filing the Writ Petitions were constrained to include all the caste based corporations as they were not having the details of the same and as such made a request for direction to respondent orders, administrative, financial statements and funding of such companies and craved leave of the court.

The court on hearing the arguments of the parties held that they have considered the submissions made by the parties. The court noted that the question for consideration is whether the selective caste based corporations and spending huge public money in any manner violates secularism. The court also noted that second question for question for consideration is whether State has legal sanction to create such corporations which are allegedly caste based.

The court further noted that third question for consideration would be whether spending public money for development of few castes would be violative of Article 27 of constitution of India.

The court held that in view of the various contentions raised, they are of the view that these issues requires detailed consideration of the court. The court while issuing a rule, posted the matter to 2nd February 2022 for final hearing.

Case title: S.Basavaraj Vs State of Karnataka