Counting People Is Not Proving Exclusion: Why Andhra Pradesh's 34% Local-Body Quota Failed the Triple Test

A Headcount Is Not a Finding of Exclusion

What the Constitution Allows **Articles

243D(6) and 243T(6) let a State legislature reserve seats for backward classes in Panchayats and Municipalities. They are enabling** provisions. Unlike the reservation for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, which the Constitution requires in proportion to their population, Backward Class reservation in local bodies is the State's choice and the State must justify it.

The Supreme Court set out how in K. Krishna Murthy v. Union of India (2010) and tightened it in Vikas Kishanrao Gawali (2021). Its triple test requires:

1. A dedicated commission that makes a contemporaneous empirical inquiry into the nature of backwardness in local bodies.
2. Reservation fixed local body by local body, in line with that commission's findings.
3. Total SC, ST and Backward Class reservation kept within 50%.

Why This Backwardness Is Different

In education and public jobs, under Articles 15(4) and 16(4), the question is social and educational backwardness. In local bodies, the Court asks a different question: political backwardness. Is this group actually under-represented in this panchayat or this municipality?

The answer can differ from one village to the next. A group may be socially backward across the State but already well represented on a particular council. That is why the test demands local-body-wise evidence, not a State-wide figure.

Where Andhra Pradesh's Case Broke Andhra

Pradesh had cut its Backward Class local-body quota from 34% to 22% in 2020 once the 50% cap was enforced. In August 2026 it tried to restore 34% through G.O. Ms. No. 105 (rural) and G.O. Rt. No. 1065 (urban).

The State said it relied on a fresh survey, local-body data and a dedicated commission. The Supreme Court Bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu was not persuaded. Figures from a unified family survey, it said, could not justify the quota without a specific empirical assessment of backwardness and representation in local bodies.

It also asked under what law the survey had been made. With SC and ST seats already reserved, adding 34% would take the total past 50%. The Bench called the High Court's approach very reasonable and dismissed the appeal on 9 October 2026.

The Party Route Chief Minister **N. Chandrababu

Naidu answered by saying the Telugu Desam Party would give 34% of its own seats to Backward Class candidates. That is legal, because the 50% ceiling binds the State's power to reserve seats, not a party's** choice of candidates.

But a party quota covers only that party's tickets, has no enforcement behind it and can be withdrawn at the next election. It is a political promise, not a constitutional entitlement.

Why This Matters for the Exam The High

Court did not bar a higher quota forever. It allowed the State to revisit the question after a proper body-specific exercise. The lesson for GS2 is that in local-body reservation, the burden is evidentiary, not ideological. States lose these cases not because Backward Classes lack a claim, but because they bring population data to a question about representation.