Supreme Court lifts stay imposed by Uttarakhand HC on 30% reservations to women having state domicile

The Supreme Court on Friday overturned the Uttarakhand High Court's injunction against the decision of the state government in 2006 that granted women with state-resident domiciles a 30% reservation in state civil services.

A bench of Justice S Abdul Nazeer and Justice V Ramasubramanian while lifting the stay, asked respondent's response on the plea challenging High Court's order.

The Uttarakhand Government moved the apex court against the October 24 order of the High Court in a batch of petitions filed by women belonging to other states objecting to the reservation.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta argued that the High Court in the garb of providing interim relief provided final relief to the respondents at the interim stage itself.

The petitioners before the High Court had argued that despite receiving more marks than the cut-off set for domicile women of the state in the preliminary exam held on April 3 of this year, they were not permitted to show up for the state services main examination.

They had contended that the Uttarakhand government lacks the authority to offer domicile-based reservations, and the Constitution only permits such reservations when a statute is passed by Parliament.

The plea before the High Court had challenged the unreserved Mahila category that had low cut-off marks for the women to pass the preliminary examinations.

Case Title: State of Uttarakhand vs Pavitra Chauhan and Ors.