JUDGMENT

Banerjee, J.-The validity of the Constitution (72nd Amendment) Act, 1992 is the core question in this writ petition and pertains to the issue of reservation. The Constitution (72nd Amendment) Act, 1992 introduced a further sub-Article (3B) to the existing Article 332, which the learned Advocate appearing in support of the petition has contended, runs counter to the constitutional requirement of population based representation for the people and proportional reservation for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the Legislative Assemblies of the States. It would be convenient, however, to advert to the relevant extracts of Article 332 at this juncture and the same reads as below:

"332. Reservation of seats for Sched

uled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the Legislative Assemblies of the States.-(1) Seats shall be reserved for the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes, [except the Scheduled Tribes in the autonomous districts of Assam], in the Legislative Assembly of every State.

(2) ......

(3) The number of seats reserved for the Scheduled Castes or the Scheduled Tribes in the Legislative Assembly of any State under clause (1) shall bear, as nearly as may be, the same pro