The Supreme Court on August 1 allowed states to create sub-categories in reservations. In this first of a three-part series, Business Standard looks at Andhra Pradesh

The most literate in the Scheduled Caste community in Andhra Pradesh has higher literacy than the state average, while less than 40 per cent in the least literate sub-group can read and write.

- SACHIN P MAMPATTA

A similar gap exists on employment with some sub-groups having a greater proportion of people with steadier employment than others. This is based on a Business Standard analysis of the Census 2011 data, which has statistics on sub-groups at state level.

A Supreme Court judgment on August 1 allowed states to create sub-categories for reservations so that it could reach more segments of the population. Andhra Pradesh had moved to create sub-categories in 1997 before it was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2004 on grounds including that it was beyond the powers of the state government to do so. This position has now been revised. The 2011 Census shows at least 60 sub-categories within the Scheduled Caste community in Andhra Pradesh.

The largest are the Madiga and Mala, or Mala Ayawaru. Each of these has over five million members. The rest are smaller, according to the census. The Adi Dravida, Adi Andhra and Relli (between 130,000 and 270,000) too are the other numerous sub-groups. Around 41 of the 60 sub-categories are those with less than 10,000.