The Supreme Court has indicated, at least for now, that the ₹8 lakh a year income cutoff used to decide who qualifies for the Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) quota looks reasonable. The observation came on Tuesday from a bench of Justice PS Narasimha and Justice Alok Aradhe while hearing a set of petitions that have been pending since 2021.
The NTA notification at the heart of the case
The case traces back to a 2021 notification issued by the National Testing Agency (NTA). Under that notification, seats reserved through the All India Quota (AIQ) for medical courses were split so that Other Backward Classes received 27% and the Economically Weaker Sections got 10%. It was this notification that petitioners challenged, and their plea came up for hearing on Tuesday.
How the EWS quota came to exist
The EWS reservation itself flows from the 103rd Constitutional Amendment, which created a 10% quota for economically weaker sections in education and government jobs. In the Janhit Abhiyan case, the Supreme Court upheld that amendment as valid in 2022. What is now before the court is not the quota itself but the income ceiling used to decide who counts as economically weaker.
Why the income limit keeps sparking debate
The ₹8 lakh a year threshold for EWS has been debated since it was first set. According to news reports, several states have revised this ceiling up or down at different points, directly changing how many applicants qualify. Separately, the central government's new income tax regime already exempts annual income up to ₹12 lakh from tax altogether, adding another layer to the ongoing argument over where the EWS income line should sit. Against that backdrop, Tuesday's remark from the bench is being read as significant, even though the court has not yet delivered a final ruling on the matter.
