New Delhi: Noting the fact that voters in a multiparty democracy are expected to vote on the basis of political ideology rather than caste or religion, the Supreme Court on Wednesday (November 4) rejected a petition that sought mandatory rotation of seats reserved for Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) in state legislative assemblies and parliament, reported LiveLaw.A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kanta along with Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V. Mohana held that that the issue falls within the legislative domain of Parliament and cannot be directed by the courts.“In a political democracy, there are multiple political parties having different ideologies. The voters are expected to vote for the party, not for the religion. You may like or dislike a particular political ideology. Who is representing that ideology becomes irrelevant. You vote for that ideology. So that also defeats your argument,” Justice Bagchi observed.Jagdish Singh, the petitioner in the case argued that he is an elector of the 191-Kadipur Assembly Constituency in Sultanpur district of Uttar Pradesh, which has remained reserved for SCs for nearly seven decades since its creation.Singh contended that the continuous reservation without rotation violated Articles 14, 15 and 19 of the Constitution, diluted the right to vote by compelling voters to choose only from SC candidates. He argued that the continuous reservation of the constituency benefited only a few families rather than the broader community and sought a system of rotation similar to that provided for panchayats and municipalities under Articles 243D and 243T.CJI Surya Kant said that the petitioner was “dialling the wrong number” as the demand for rotation should be raised before Parliament.“This is a good season of protests, naarebaazi. So this is also a good ground for protest,” CJI Kant added.Justice Bagchi also disagreed with the contentions with the logic that the majority community in a constituency will anyway get elected, and hence SC reservation is unnecessary in a constituency with high SC population.“That proceeds on the idea that a majority community will vote on community or caste lines. They may not vote on community and caste lines. The high court cannot judicially pronounce on a democratic choice. That is for the voters to decide,” Justice Bagchi said.Singh’s petition challenged Section 9(1)(c) of the Delimitation Act, 2002, which requires reserved constituencies to be located in areas where the proportion of SC/ST population is comparatively large. He approached the Supreme Court after the Allahabad high court upheld Section 9(1)(c) and refused to order rotation of reserved seats.“The High Court has turned down the case observing that although ideally rotation ought to be followed, such a recourse cannot be directed by the court and it is in the ambit of the Parliament. We see no ground to take a different view. The petitioner may approach the public representatives to build consensus with a view to persuade them to follow the rotation principle which the petitioner relies upon on the basis of the reservation made by the delimitation commission in 2008,” the apex court said in its order, reporterd LiveLaw.