Hyderabad: The Telangana assembly on Tuesday unanimously passed the Telangana Scheduled Castes (Rationalisation of Reservations) Bill, 2025, giving legal sanctity to the sub-categorisation of the community into three groups. Once the governor gives his assent to the bill, Telangana will become the first state to have sub-categorisation since the Supreme Court order in Aug last year.
The bill classifies the 52.17 lakh SC population in the state, comprising 59 castes, into three groups, as opposed to four groups in undivided Andhra Pradesh. Group-I, with 15 castes, has been given 1% reservation, Group-II, with 18 communities gets 9% and Group-III, with 26 castes receives 5% quota, totalling 15%.
Group-I comprises the most socially and economically disadvantaged and overlooked SC communities. Group-II includes moderately benefited castes, and the last group includes significantly benefited communities from reservations over the years. The first two groups mostly comprise Madigas and their sub-castes, while the third consists of Malas and their sub-castes.
The assembly, however, rejected the demand from both Madiga and Mala community MLAs and their leaders to increase the SC quota from 15% to 18% or increase the groups from three to four. Chief minister A Revanth Reddy said his govt would increase the reservation once SC numbers are revealed in the central govt’s census in 2026. The current numbers are based on the 2011 census.
“I hope that this historic bill will provide a permanent solution to the decades-long demand of the community for fair distribution of reservation and would stand as a model to the country in social justice,” Revanth said.
State health minister Damodar Rajanarasimha, who belongs to the SC community, initiated the discussion on the bill in the assembly and sought to assure the community that all care had been taken to follow Supreme Court directions.
“The govt brought the bill by accepting the report submitted by the one-man commission ,” he said. “Only the creamy layer recommendation was not accepted. The commission categorised the SC community into three groups based on comprehensive empirical data and in tune with the essence of the Supreme Court judgement.”
The Shameem Akhter commission had said that classification of SCs into two or four groups would have resulted in an imbalance between developed and under-developed castes. “This bill is not against any community, but is aimed at ensuring social justice,” Rajanarasimha said. “Many sub-castes were shifted from the earlier categorised groups (in undivided AP). They were found to be most under-developed and needed preferential treatment.”
As many as 15 most disadvantaged, backward, and overlooked sub-castes were given preferential treatment in Group-I. Even the Supreme Court had said preferential treatment should be given to such groups. As a result, the govt gave them 1% reservation despite their small numbers.
Rajanarasimha added that categorisation was not the ultimate solution but an instrument for the betterment of disadvantaged SC communities. Financial assistance, quality education and skill development, house sites, and industrial policies were needed to eliminate the socio-economic backwardness of the community.
The minister said that 24 SC communities would be most affected by the categorisation. Of these 15 sub-castes were identified as most backward.
The Congress govt had constituted a cabinet sub-committee on categorisation in Sept 2024 about a month after the Supreme Court order. The Shameem Akhter Commission was set up in Oct 2024, which submitted its report on February 3, 2025. The cabinet approved it a day later and the assembly approved the categorisation report the same day. In a resolution, the assembly urged the central govt to conduct a caste census at the national level.