Examine whether differential application of income criteria to government vs non-government employed parents in the OBC creamy-layer test violates the principle of equality before law.

The creamy-layer filter, evolved judicially in Indra Sawhney (1992), excludes socially advanced OBCs from reservation under Article 16(4) [1]. Its administrative application, however, has judged children of government servants by parental rank and children of PSU/private employees by parental salary — a divergence now held constitutionally untenable.

The differential and its origin

• The 1993 DoPT Office Memorandum built exclusion around the status of the post held by parents (Group A/Group B), expressly keeping salary and agricultural income out of the income/wealth test [4].
• A later executive clarification applied the income ceiling — presently Rs 8 lakh per annum for non-service income — to salaries drawn in PSUs, banks and private firms [3].
• Its rationale was practical: no notified equivalence of posts exists between government and non-government employment, so salary served as a proxy for rank.

Why it offends equality

• Article 14 permits classification only with an intelligible differentia and a rational nexus to the object; two OBC children of identical social standing being tested by different yardsticks defeats that nexus [1].
• In Union of India v. Rohith Nathan (11 March 2026), the Court held that excluding PSU/private employees' children solely on salary amounts to "hostile discrimination", and that a 2004 clarificatory letter cannot override the 1993 OM [2].
• Indra Sawhney anchored the doctrine in social advancement, not income alone; administrative convenience cannot dilute a constitutional entitlement [1].

The countervailing concern

• Salary is objective and verifiable, while the post-status test stays unworkable until equivalence is notified — risking under-exclusion of the genuinely affluent.
• Retrospective correction carries costs: the supernumerary-posts remedy under Article 142 restores numbers but not seniority, promotion or cadre placement [2] — hence the Centre's pending plea on ongoing CSE allocations.

The differential test thus fails the equality standard while the underlying exclusion remains valid. The durable fix is executive, not litigative: DoPT must notify a transparent equivalence of non-government posts and revise ceilings periodically, so that the creamy-layer filter screens advancement rather than employer, honouring Articles 14 and 16 together.