TN CM Stalin To Consult With Legal Experts For Ensuring 10.5% Quota For Vanniyars

The comment of TN CM Stalin comes after Supreme Court (on March 31) struck down the 10.5 percent reservation provided to Vanniyar community.

TN CM Stalin at Assembly (File Photo/ABP Nadu)

Chennai: The Tamil Nadu government will consult legal experts to uphold the 10.5 percent reservation for Vanniyars (Most Backward Community) just as it secured 7.5 per cent quota for students of state-run schools for admission in professional courses, Chief Minister M K Stalin told the Assembly on Thursday.

Refusing to be drawn into an argument that the law to provide 10.5 percent reservation for Vanniyars is "temporary," he said "this is an issue concerning the state's social justice and special reservation." "As far as the quota for Vanniyars is concerned, the government will consult legal experts and surely uphold social justice," he said responding to a special call attention motion brought by AIADMK, the Vanniyar dominated Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) and Tamizhaga Vazhurimai Katchi (TVK).

He pointed out that the Supreme Court had clearly observed that the state legislature and government have powers to enact laws on (internal) reservation.

Accusing the previous AIADMK regime of hurriedly enacting the reservation legislation, the Chief Minister claimed though the recommendation was made in 2012, the then AIADMK government had enacted the law only in 2021 and that too "half-an-hour before the election commission's model code of conduct came into force" for the April Assembly election. The Supreme Court (on March 31) struck down the 10.5 percent reservation provided to Vanniyar community saying there is no substantial basis for treating them differently, he pointed out. The bench had upheld the Madras High Court order quashing the reservation.

Though the 2021 Act was brought by the AIADMK, his government engaged senior counsels: Rakesh Dwivedi, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Mukul Rohatgi and P Wilson to effectively argue the case since it was the DMK that had ensured 20 percent reservation for MBC, the Chief Minister said. "But both the Madras High Court and the Supreme Court struck down the reservation as the AIADMK government brought the legislation in haste," Stalin alleged.