When the Centre goes to the Supreme Court on May 8 for an early hearing in the OBC quota case, it will face the same bench that stayed the law on May 29 and declined to vacate that stay: the two-judge bench of Justice Arijit Pasayat and Justice L S Panta, sources told The Indian Express.

On April 24, the Government had gone to Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan and Justice R V Raveendran asking for advancing the hearing in the case from August to May citing the fact that a delay would cause an “irreparable loss to a large number of students.”

Responding to counsel of petitioners who opposed advancing of the hearing, the CJI had asserted his “prerogative” to do so but didn’t specify which bench would hear the matter on May 8.

When Attorney General Milon K Banerjee had made a special “mention” of the application before the CJI, the Centre faced lot of flak from counsel of the anti-quota petitioners. Senior advocate Mukul Rohtagi strongly opposed the Centre’s application and said: “It is unfair without going to the same Bench, Centre is seeking an early hearing. That, too, in a matter with an already fixed and scheduled date.”

The petitioners said the Government’s move was “a calculated attempt not to go before the same Bench.”