Note- Please ignore the grammatical mistakes. A 2026 Supreme Court ruling dictates that UPSC candidates availing any relaxation (age, attempt limit, or cut-off) at any stage cannot switch to the unreserved (general) category, even if their final score surpasses the general merit. This cements that only candidates who compete without relaxation at all stages are eligible for general seats. Sounds good and neutral but here is the irony and it matters,to talk on thise because people are selected on highest positions through this exam. Here is any relaxation means. – Age relaxation – Extra attempt – Reduced cutt off – feee concession Supreme court said if someone doesn’t take any of this relaxation is qualified for general seat a merit based selection. Supreme court clearly mentioned, A reserved category candidate who has availed any relaxation or concession at any stage of the examination (including the Preliminary Examination) cannot be treated as a “General/Unreserved” candidate for cadre allocation, even if their final merit rank is higher than a general category candidate. But according to upsc’s rules and regulations you need to give correct information about yourself otherwise you would be disqualified on the ground of misinformation. Hence, you must tell them you belong from backward community when your applying for the exam. And when you do this you don’t need to pay the fees of 100 rs, as Female/Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe/Physically Handicapped (40% and more) candidates are exempted from payment of fee. but then it means your taking benifits of fee exemption which is also concession (relaxation) and it result, you will not be eligible for general seat whether you scored higher than general cutt off. This will force you to get seat from reserved category only and not from general qouta despite your ready to compete for general seats which is open to all for a merit based selection. Let’s understand simply, For instance, if someone belongs from ST category and he is also from well doing family and ready to apply for general seat but still he can’t do that as he must give valid information about him, he can’t lie that he is from general category. If he lie he will disqualified and if he tell the thruth he must avail relaxation of fee concession which stop him to fight for merit based seats. But problem is not only this, According to the Indra Sawhney judgment, reservation should ordinarily not exceed 50%, leaving the remaining posts to be filled through open competition. As reserved category students must mention that they are from reserved category that means they spontaneously avail relaxation of fee concession and will not be eligible for general quota seats so they limit themselves to the reserved seats and and general qouta automatically and indirectly became reserved for open categories whether it is supreme court’s intention or not. Let’s look it through the specific cast, As SC category has 15% reservation in the jobs and in upsc also it means the candidate from this category compete only for this 15% seats as he excluded from merit based qouta unintentionally despite supreme court mention that unreserved qouta is open for all candidates. In this situation most of the students who fill reserved qouta belong from well doing family as they will score higher than the most backward candidates and it is obvious as “We can’t compare a needy student struggling with resources to a student with all advantages in hand.” this will exclude and reduced the opportunities of those who lack the resources and alienate the marginalized. Here my point is that the current system limiting sc’s to that 15% qouta since they can’t compete for unreserved seat as they are categorised as backward by availing relaxation of fee concession. It will not happen only with SCs but to other backward communities aslo say STs and OBCs. “Our constitution says minimum reservation for backwards not limited representation for backwards” But this system is limiting the representation of backwards and favoring open categories which is historically dominant group. Because of this system that dominant group will get higher representation and other communities will limited to only reserved seats means backwards will remains in minority and upper casts gets the majority in on the highest government jobs in the country. As backward community will compete only for there reserved seats most marginalized will automatically excluded from competition because of less opportunities as they have limited access to resources than the one who has easy access to resources. hence hierarchy will create within the community. And then the real marginalized will not get the chance to avail the highest post through opportunities and it’s became exclusion of lower cast and the most needy. If the judgements like this still going to came in future then it is the biggest issue as it making backwards the minority in the higher authorities. The judgement is like favouring upper casts rather than the helping lower caste.