Supreme Court refuses to restrain the Bihar government from acting on the Caste- Survey data

On October 06, 2023, the Supreme Court refused to restrain the Bihar government from acting on the Caste- Survey data. The matter was heard today by Justice SVN Bhatti and Justice Sanjiv Khanna. The bench said, “We cannot stop the state government or any government from taking decisions. That would be wrong.” During the court proceedings, Senior Advocate Shyam Divan argued that no order was passed by the court against the publication of the data. He further argued, “This data has been collected unlawfully and cannot be acted upon.” The SC bench after hearing the contentions ordered, “We cannot stop the state government or any government from taking a decision. That would be wrong. But, if there is an issue with regard to data, that will be considered. We are going to examine the other issue regarding the power of the state government to conduct this exercise. We will look into other issues as well...privacy apart, because privacy may not be a concern since names and [other identifiers] are not being published. But, the other parts, we will examine.”