Other Backward Classes

Also called: OBCs, Backward castes · Topic: Safeguards for Vulnerable Sections: SCs, STs, OBCs, Minorities, Women and Children · NCERT: Class 10, Ch 3 "Gender, Religion and Caste"; Class 12, Ch 8 "Recent Developments in Indian Politics"

Meaning

Other Backward Classes (OBCs) are communities, other than Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs), that are socially and educationally backward. The Constitution calls them socially and educationally backward classes (SEBCs) (Art. 15(4), Art. 340, Art. 342A).

They are one of the largest groups in India. The National Sample Survey (NSS) 2004-05 put them at about 41% of the population. They get 27% reservation in central government jobs and central educational institutions, but the creamy layer is left out. Questions about OBCs come up often in exams and in the news: the 50% ceiling, the creamy-layer income limit, the NCBC and sub-categorisation.

Explanation

Who counts as an OBC

• "Backward" means more than poor. These groups lag behind in two ways:
• social standing (how society treats them);

• schooling (how much education they get).

• OBCs are separate from SCs and STs. A community cannot be in two of these lists at once.

• The Census does not count OBCs. It counts only SCs and STs.
• So every OBC estimate comes from surveys or old data.

• The Mandal Commission's 52% figure used 1931 Census data, the last census that counted caste.

• Reservation for OBCs is affirmative action. This means special help from the state, such as reserved jobs or seats, for a disadvantaged group. It aims at real equal opportunity, not just equal treatment on paper.

How a community is identified: commissions and lists

• Art. 340: the President may appoint a commission to study:
• the conditions of SEBCs;
• the problems they face;
• what the Union and the states should do to help them.

• The commission reports to the President. The report is laid before each House of Parliament along with a note on the action taken.

• Three commissions under Art. 340 [3]:

• Kalelkar (1953, report 1955): listed 2,399 backward castes, 837 of them "most backward". The chairman himself doubted that caste should be the test. The Union rejected the report and left it to the states.
• Mandal (appointed 1 January 1979, report 31 December 1980): used 11 indicators (social, educational and economic). It found 3,743 castes backward and recommended 27% reservation.

• Rohini (2017): set up to study sub-categorisation (see below) [2][3].

• Two kinds of lists today:

• the central list, notified by the President under Art. 342A, used only for the Union's own purposes;
• state lists, which each state or UT makes by law. These may differ from the central list [4].

Limits on OBC reservation

• 27% quota, inside a 50% ceiling.
• SC 15% + ST 7.5% + OBC 27% = 49.5%.

• Indra Sawhney (1992) set a 50% ceiling on total reservation.

• Creamy layer: the better-off members of a backward class. They are excluded, so that benefits reach the people who still need them.

• It is set by the DoPT Office Memorandum (OM) of 8 September 1993, based on the Expert Committee under Justice R.N. Prasad. (An OM is an executive order issued by a ministry.)
• The test looks at the parents, not the candidate.
• Status test: children of people holding constitutional posts (such as President, judges and UPSC members) and of Group A and Group B officers (direct recruits) are excluded.

• Income/wealth test: applies to everyone else. Salary and farm income are not counted. The candidate's own income and the spouse's income are also not counted [10].

• The income limit has gone up over time:

Year	Annual parental income limit
1993	₹1 lakh
2004	₹2.5 lakh
2008	₹4.5 lakh
2013	₹6 lakh
2017	₹8 lakh

• In 2004 the Cabinet decided to revise the limit in line with the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a measure of rising prices.
• In 2017 it raised the limit from ₹6 lakh to ₹8 lakh, citing the rise in CPI [7]. The limit has not changed since 2017 [8].
• Also in 2017, the Cabinet matched posts in central PSUs, banks and insurance bodies with government posts. This lets children of their lower-grade staff get OBC benefits [9].

Sub-categorisation

• Sub-categorisation: splitting the OBC quota into smaller groups.
• The most backward castes then get a fixed share.

• Dominant OBC castes can no longer take all of it.

• Rohini Commission: chaired by Justice G. Rohini, retired Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court, and set up on 2 October 2017 [2][3]. Its tasks [2]: 1. study how unevenly benefits are shared among castes in the central OBC list; 2. work out a scientific method for sub-categorisation; 3. fix repetitions, ambiguities and spelling errors in the central list.

• After 14 extensions, it gave its report to the President on 31 July 2023 [2]. The report has not been made public.

• A 2018 analysis found that about one-quarter of central-list OBC castes took about 97% of jobs and seats, and nearly a thousand castes got nothing (figures to be verified).
• Some states already sub-categorise:
• Bihar: Extremely Backward Classes (EBC) and Backward Classes (BC);
• Andhra Pradesh and Telangana: BC groups A, B, C, D (and E).

In the Constitution and practice

• Constitutional basis:
• Art. 15(4): the state may make special provisions for SEBCs.
• Art. 16(4): the state may reserve posts for backward classes that are not fairly represented in its services.
• Art. 340: backward classes commission.

• Art. 338B, Art. 342A, Art. 366(26C): added by the 102nd Amendment (2018) [5].

• Jobs: the Mandal story.

• The DoPT OM of 13 August 1990 gave 27% in central jobs.
• Indra Sawhney v. Union of India (1992) upheld it, with a creamy layer exclusion and a 50% ceiling.
• OBC reservation actually began in September 1993.

• Indra Sawhney II (2000): Kerala claimed its OBCs had no creamy layer. The Court struck this down, because excluding the creamy layer is part of equality under Arts. 14 and 16.

• Education:

• P.A. Inamdar (2005): the state cannot force quotas on private unaided colleges, meaning colleges that take no government money.
• 93rd Amendment (2005) added Art. 15(5). It allows special provisions in admissions, including in private institutions, aided or unaided. Minority institutions under Art. 30(1) are left out.
• Central Educational Institutions (Reservation in Admission) Act 2006: 27% OBC seats in IITs, IIMs and central universities.
• Ashoka Kumar Thakur (10 April 2008): upheld these for state-run and state-aided institutions, with the creamy layer excluded.
• Pramati (2014): extended Art. 15(5) to private unaided institutions. It held that the 93rd Amendment does not break the basic structure (the core features of the Constitution that Parliament cannot destroy).

• Neil Aurelio Nunes (2022): upheld the 27% OBC quota in the NEET All-India Quota. It said merit must be seen in its social context.

• NCBC (National Commission for Backward Classes):

• The NCBC Act 1993 created it as a statutory body (set up by an ordinary law), as Indra Sawhney had directed. It only advised on adding castes to, or removing them from, the central list.
• The 102nd Amendment (2018), passed as the 123rd Bill, 2017, made it a constitutional body under Art. 338B [6]. It now:
  • monitors safeguards for SEBCs;
  • hears specific complaints;
  • advises on their development.

• The Union and the states must consult it on major policy matters affecting SEBCs [5].

• Who makes the list:

• Art. 342A: the President, after consulting the Governor, notifies the SEBCs by public notification. After that, only Parliament, by law, can change the list [6].
• Maratha case (Jaishri Laxmanrao Patil, 5 May 2021):
  • struck down the Maratha quota, which crossed the 50% ceiling without exceptional circumstances;
  • by a 3:2 majority, read Art. 342A as taking away the states' power to identify SEBCs.

• 105th Amendment (August 2021), passed as the 127th Bill, 2021, restored that power through Art. 342A(3) and an amended Art. 366(26C). States need not consult the NCBC for their own lists [4].

• Union of India v. Rohith Nathan (11 March 2026), 2026 INSC 230 [10]:

• Facts: an OBC candidate ranked AIR 174 in the Civil Services Examination 2012. He was put in the creamy layer because his father's salary at a private firm was above the limit.
• The rule challenged: para 9 of a 2004 DoPT letter counted salary for PSU and private employees. Government employees' children were judged by post, and their salary was ignored.
• Holdings:
  • a clarificatory letter cannot override the 1993 OM;
  • deciding status by income alone, without looking at the parent's post, is unsustainable;
  • judging these wards by salary while judging government wards by post is hostile discrimination (treating equals unequally) under Arts. 14, 15 and 16.
• Directions: the Court ordered supernumerary posts (extra posts outside the normal count) and implementation within six months.

Don't confuse with

• SCs and STs: they are listed under Arts. 341 and 342 and counted in the Census. OBCs are not counted in the Census, and their central list falls under Art. 342A.
• Creamy layer vs sub-categorisation: the creamy layer removes better-off individuals or families from the quota. Sub-categorisation splits the castes in the list into groups with separate shares.
• 102nd vs 105th Amendment:
• The 102nd (2018, 123rd Bill) made the NCBC constitutional and added Arts. 338B, 342A and 366(26C) [5].

• The 105th (2021, 127th Bill) added Art. 342A(3), so states can again make their own lists [4].

• Kalelkar vs Mandal Commission:

• Kalelkar (1953): 2,399 castes; the report was rejected by the Union.
• Mandal (1979): 3,743 castes; the report was implemented in 1990 and upheld in 1992.

Prelims Hooks

• Art. 340 → the President appoints a backward classes commission. Kalelkar (1953), Mandal (1979) and Rohini (2017) were all set up under it [3].
• Mandal: 11 indicators, 3,743 castes, 52% estimate from 1931 Census data, 27% quota. It was implemented by the DoPT OM of 13 August 1990 and upheld in Indra Sawhney (1992).
• Trap: the 102nd Amendment Act came from the 123rd Bill, and the 105th Act came from the 127th Bill [4].
• Creamy layer: DoPT OM of 8 September 1993 (Prasad Committee). The income test leaves out salary and farm income. The limit has been ₹8 lakh since 2017 [7][8].
• Case–principle pairs:
• Indra Sawhney II (2000) → states cannot refuse to apply the creamy layer;
• Pramati (2014) → Art. 15(5) is valid for private unaided colleges;
• Neil Aurelio Nunes (2022) → OBC quota in the NEET All-India Quota;

• Rohith Nathan (2026) → judging by salary alone is hostile discrimination [10].

• Art. 15(5) does not apply to minority educational institutions under Art. 30(1).

Mains Points

• Fair shares within the quota:
• The Rohini data shows that about a quarter of castes take about 97% of benefits. So dominant OBC castes capture most of the gains.

• Sub-categorisation would spread benefits more fairly. But the report is still not public, and without a caste count in the Census the data is weak.

• Fixing the creamy-layer test:

• The ₹8 lakh limit has not moved since 2017 [8], even though the CPI principle was adopted in 2004.
• Rohith Nathan exposed a deeper flaw. PSU and private posts have no government equivalent, so income is used in place of status, which is unfair [10].

• Reforms: revise the limit regularly in line with CPI, and match posts across all sectors.

• Federalism and the NCBC:

• The Maratha judgment and then the 105th Amendment show Parliament stepping in to protect the states' role in identifying backward classes [4].
• Downsides:
  • separate central and state lists can cause confusion and disputes;
  • the 50% ceiling still limits what states can do;
  • the NCBC is constitutional but only advisory, and states need not consult it for their own lists [4][5].

Related concepts

• Backward Classes Commission (Article 340)
• Kalelkar Commission
• OBC reservation
• Ashoka Kumar Thakur case
• Creamy layer
• 102nd Constitutional Amendment Act 2018
• 105th Constitutional Amendment Act 2021
• Rohini Commission

Read more

• Other Backward Classes: commissions, creamy layer, NCBC and sub-categorisation