Appointment of Assistant Professors in Calicut varsity may face legal challenges

Supreme Court registers plea against verdict on reservation in recruitments

The appointment of 53 Assistant Professors in the University of Calicut is likely to face legal challenges as the Supreme Court has registered a petition against the verdict of a Kerala High Court Division Bench related to reservation in recruitments.

The plea was filed by Rajesh Komath, Ahmed Shariff, and Roshni Prabhakaran, who had applied for those posts. Haris Beeran, their lawyer, pointed out in the petition that the High Court verdict had not included the fact that posts for differently abled persons as per the Right of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, had already been determined even before issuing notification for the appointment. Also, the notification had not included the 3% posts reserved for the disabled since 1996 and the backlog posts since 2016 after the Act increased the reservation limit to 4%.

The Supreme Court had earlier ruled that ‘vertical’ reservation followed by the university was illegal and that ‘horizontal’ reservation should be followed. The university, however, reportedly did not take this into consideration while appointing the faculty recently. The reservation of Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and Other Backward Classes is referred to as vertical reservation as it is applicable to each group specified under the law. Horizontal reservation is applicable to categories such as women, senior citizens, people with disabilities and transgender persons who are given equal opportunities.