Eighty-First Amendment Act, 2000

Empowered the state to consider the unfilled reserved vacancies of a year as a separate class of vacancies to be filled up in any succeeding year or years. Such class of vacancies is not to be combined with the vacancies of the year in which they are being filled up to determine the ceiling of 50 percent reservation on a total number of vacancies of that year. In brief, this amendment ended the 50 percent ceiling on a reservation in backlog vacancies.

Background

It was in 1990 that the V.P. Singh Government declared      reservation of 27% government jobs for the OBCs. In the famous Mandal case (1992), though the Supreme Court upheld the constitutional validity of 27% reservation for the OBCs it gave certain conditions:

• No reservation in promotions; reservation should be confined to initial appointments only. Any existing reservation in promotions can continue for five years only (i.e., up to 1997).
• The total reserved quota should not exceed 50% except in some extraordinary situations. This rule should be applied every year.
• The ‘carry forward rule’ in case of unfilled (backlog) vacancies is valid. But it should not violate the 50% rule.
• A permanent statutory body should be established to examine complaints of over-inclusion and under-inclusion in the list of OBCs.

 With regard to the above rulings of the Supreme Court the government took the following actions:

•  Ram Nandan Committee was appointed.
•  The 77th Amendment Act was enacted in 1995
•  81st Amendment Act of 2000 was enacted
•  The 76th Amendment Act of 1994 has placed the Tamil Nadu
•  Reservations Act of 1994 in the Ninth Schedule.