Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday cancelled all the Other Backward Class (OBC) certificates issued in West Bengal after 2010.
The ruling by the division bench of Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Rajasekhar Mantha effectively means that all OBC certificates issued by the current Trinamool Congress regime that came to power in 2011 now stand cancelled.
Following the order, over 5,00,000 OBC certificates issued since 2010 cannot be used for seeking reservations for jobs now.
However, there is an exemption for those who have already secured jobs using the certificates issued during that period, as the latest order will have no impact on them, the bench ruled.
While passing the order, the bench observed that since the certificates issued after 2010 were not issued in accordance with the prescribed legal procedures, they stand cancelled.
The bench ruled that the state Assembly will now decide who all are eligible to apply for OBC certificates. It also said that the West Bengal Backward Class Commission will now decide the list of caste categories that can be included in the OBC list.
As per the rule, the Commission recommends the list and forwards the same to the state Assembly which takes the final decision on this count.
In the past, there have been several complaints relating to irregularities in issuing OBC certificates in West Bengal, as a result of which several eligible persons were deprived of the certificates as several non-eligible candidates were included in the list.