The Allahabad High Court on Wednesday quashed three Uttar Pradesh government orders which included 18 communities belonging to Other Backward Classes to the list of Scheduled Castes, India Today reported.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal and Justice JJ Munir allowed a public interest litigation challenging two notifications issued under the Akhilesh Yadav-led government in 2016 and another such notification by the Adityanath government in 2019.

The judges said that under Article 341 of the Constitution, only Parliament has the right to change the Scheduled Castes list. The High Court added that the Constitution does not give any right to the Central and the state governments to change this list.

The Uttar Pradesh government had included Majhwar, Kahar, Kashyap, Kevat, Mallah, Nishad, Kumhar, Prajapati, Dheevar, Bind, Bhar, Rajbhar, Dhiman, Batham, Turha, Godia, Manjhi and Machua backward communities to the category of the Scheduled Castes, according to India Today.

The Samajwadi Party said that the reservation given to the 18 most backward communities has been cancelled because of ineffective action by the Bharatiya Janata Party government in court.

“BJP also gave lollipops to these castes but did not keep its promise,” the party said. “This is a complete betrayal of those of the 18 most backward castes. Where are those BJP leaders who do politics of backward castes and the leaders of their allies? An answer is needed from the BJP government for its anti-backward step.”