The Scheduled Castes (SCs) is a politico-legal concept and a constitutional category in India, defined as castes, races, or tribes deemed to be Scheduled Castes for the purposes of the Constitution under Article 366(24). The term originated in the Government of India Act, 1935, replacing the earlier colonial term "Depressed Classes". The concept was created to address the historical problem of extreme social, educational, and economic backwardness, primarily arising from the age-old practice of untouchability, which placed these communities outside the traditional four-tier Varna system.
The mechanism for identifying and listing these communities is established by Article 341 of the Constitution. Article 341(1) empowers the President of India to specify the list of SCs for each State or Union Territory by public notification, after consulting with the Governor. Once the initial list is notified, Article 341(2) grants the exclusive power to Parliament to include or exclude any community from the list through an enacted law, ensuring stability and preventing executive discretion from altering the list. This was recently reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar Vichar Manch Bihar, Patna v. The State of Bihar & Ors. (2024), which quashed a state government's attempt to merge a community into the SC list, emphasizing that only Parliament has the authority to amend the list.
The SC concept connects directly to the system of affirmative action, or reservation, guaranteed by provisions like Article 15(4) (special provisions for advancement) and Article 16(4A) (reservation in promotion). It is also linked to the National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC), a constitutional body established under Article 338. The NCSC was created in 2004 following the 89th Constitutional Amendment Act, 2003, which bifurcated the erstwhile combined body for SCs and STs. Recent changes include the passage of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order (Amendment) Bill, 2024, which added the Valmiki community as a synonym for existing SCs in the list for Jammu & Kashmir.