The time may have come for an authoritative pronouncement on the question whether the concept of ‘creamy layer’ ought to be applied to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. The Union government has called upon the Supreme Court to form a seven-judge Bench to reconsider the formulation in M. Nagaraj vs Union of India (2006) that it should be applied to the SC and ST communities. This verdict was a reality check to the concept of reservation. Even while upholding Constitution amendments meant to preserve reservation in promotions as well as consequential seniority, it contained an exposition of the equality principle that hedged reservation against a set of constitutional requirements, without which the structure of equal opportunity would collapse. These were ‘quantifiable data’ to show the backwardness of a community, the inadequacy of its representation in service, and the lack of adverse impact on “the overall efficiency of administration”. This placed a question mark on the continuance of quota policies of various State governments due to non-compliance with these parameters. In Jarnail Singh (2018), another Constitution Bench reaffirmed the applicability of creamy layer norms to SC/STs. On this ground, it felt that Nagaraj did not merit reconsideration. However, it ruled that…