NEW DELHI: The constitutional scheme that the 2001 census data would be used for giving proportionate representation to Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) in Lok Sabha and legislative assemblies is “unambiguous”, the Supreme Court said today.
A bench of Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justice D Y Chandrachud was hearing a plea of NGO Public Interest Committee for Scheduling Specific Areas (PICSSA) that ‘Limbu’ and ‘Tamang’ communities, belonging to ST category, have been denied proportionate representation in West Bengal and Sikkim.
The plea, filed by lawyer Prashant Bhushan, also referred to the rise in ST population in Sikkim and West Bengal and said that the not reserving the seats for them amounted to “denial of constitutional rights of the STs”.
The population of Limbu and Tamang communities in Sikkim (rpt in Sikkim) was 20.60 per cent in 2001 and it rose to 33.8 per cent in 2011, it said, adding that in Darjeeling area of West Bengal, the ST population rose to 21.5 per cent in 2011 from 12.69 per cent of 2001. (AGENCIES)
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