British administrators used the abbreviation OBC to mean ‘Other Backward Castes’, in the Constitution; however, OBC refers to backward classes other than Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. They are described as ‘socially and educationally backward classes of citizen’, ‘socially and educationally backward classes’ and as ‘backward class of citizens’ the different Articles of the Constitution.
After independence, OBCs have been identified through specially appointed commissions. Communities are included in the list of OBCs on the basis of their social and economic backwardness.
The Godia Lohar community given to wandering the large castes, for instance, included is the central list of OBCs for Rajasthan, the washer men community is included in central list of OBCs for Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab, Chandigarh, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Goa. There are several such communities in the OBC list for different states.
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Identification of communities as Other Backward Classes has a long history. After 1806, the listings in colonial period were undertaken as the basis of administrative reports and assessments. In January 1953, the Kaka Kalelkar Commission was constituted to identify the criteria and prepare a list of OBCs.
It laid down four criteria to identify OBCs: low social position in caste hierarchy, lack of general educational advancement among the majority of the caste/ community, inadequate or lack of representation in government service, and industry.
The Commission listed 2399 communities as backward and 837 of them as ‘most backward’. Five out of ten members of the Commission submitted dissenting notes. In 1979, the Mandal Commission was set up. The Mandal Commission developed a composite index of backwardness consisting of social, educational and economic indicators. Currently reservation of 27 per cent of seats in higher educational institutions and jobs in public sector is being sought by OBCs.