NEW DELHI: Opposing a plea to bring Dalit Christians and Dalit Muslims within the ambit of Scheduled Castes to grant them reservation, the Centre on Wednesday told the Supreme Court that it rejected the findings of the Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission to include them in the SC list as the report was prepared within the “four walls of a house” without any field study and consultation.
Solicitor general Tushar Mehta told a bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Abhay S Oka and Vikram Nath that the Centre has appointed a new three-member commission under former Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan to examine whether SC status could be accorded to new persons who claim to have historically belonged to the SC community but converted to other religions. The other members of the commission are former IAS officer Ravinder Kumar Jain and University Grants Commission member Sushma Yadav.
