New Delhi: The Tamil Nadu government has moved Supreme Court challenging the Madras high court’s recent verdict that struck down a government order (G.O.) from 2024 which permitted individuals from Backward Classes (BC), Most Backward Classes (MBC), and other reserved categories to retain reservation benefits after converting to Islam, reported Deccan Herald.A special leave petition was filed in the Supreme Court by the state on July 6 against the high court’s verdict.Earlier, while striking down the 2024 G.O. the high court’s division bench of Justices G.R. Swaminathan and P.B. Balaji had underlined that the order. was not only “unconstitutional” but “un-islamic” as well.The ruling came as the court was hearing a petition filed in 2022 by a Thoothukudi resident born to Hindu parents who had converted to Islam in 2015. After changing his name, he sought a community certificate identifying him as ‘Muslim Lebbai’. The Kayathar Tahsildar turned down the application after which he approached the court.While the petition was pending, the Tamil Nadu government had issued a G.O. in 2024 that allowed converts to Islam from Backward Classes, Most Backward Classes, Denotified Communities, or Scheduled Castes to be treated as BC (Muslim) and receive a community certificate under one of the seven notified Muslim sects. The seven notified Muslim sects are Ansar, Dekkani Muslims, Dubekula, Labbais (including Rowthar and Marakayar), Mapilla, Sheik, and Syed.However, those who had converted from the so-called forward communities, were excluded from this benefit. The state had asserted that the order merely ensured those already availing reservation benefits would not lose them upon converting to Islam.The G.O. was issued after the recommendation of the Tamil Nadu Backward Classes Commission in February 2024, reported Deccan Herald.The high court had ruled that by clubbing Scheduled Caste (SC) converts with Backward Class converts under the same seven-sect framework, the state had lumped together categories that the Supreme Court has consistently treated as distinct.“We have no option but to conclude that only to undo the judgments of the court, has the government come out with an innovation that is not only unconstitutional but also un-Islamic. Once we find that the G.O is illegal, it is our bounden judicial duty to declare it to be so. We accordingly declare that the G.O is unconstitutional,” the bench had said while disposing of the petition.