Jodhpur, Sept. 20 -- The Rajasthan high court has sought the state government's response to a public interest litigation challenging the provision of over 50% reservation across categories in state Panchayati Raj institutions. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay K. Agrawal and justice Vinit Kumar Mathur issued notice to the state government. Additional Advocate General Rajesh Panwar accepted the notice and the matter will next be heard on September 23. The petition was filed by Kamlesh Kumar through advocate Moti Singh. It challenges the constitutional validity of Sections 15(5), 15(6) and 16(5) of the Rajasthan Panchayati Raj Act, 1994, besides two notifications issued by the Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Department on August 10 and August 13, 2026. According to the petition, the notifications directed district collectors and sub-divisional officers to determine and allocate reservation for the 2026 general elections to Panchayati Raj institutions. The petitioner has questioned the reservation exercise conducted following a lottery held on August 13. The petition contends that Article 243D of the Constitution provides for reservation for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in proportion to their population and mandates that at least one-third of such reserved seats be reserved for women. It further provides that at least one-third of all directly elected seats in every panchayat be reserved for women. The petitioner argued that although the constitutional provision lays down a minimum reservation for women, any enhancement by the state must be reasonable, rational and non-arbitrary and comply with Article 14 of the Constitution. Referring to a 2010 Rajasthan High Court judgment in Mohd. Kaleem vs State of Rajasthan, the petition argued that reservation cannot be excessive or disproportionate and that the state must place relevant material before the court to justify enhanced reservation. It also relied on the Supreme Court's 2019 judgment in Vikas Kishanrao Gawali vs State of Maharashtra to argue that reservation in local bodies should be based on relevant, local body-specific data and that the prescribed ceiling for aggregate vertical reservation of SC, ST and OBC categories should be respected. The petitioner claimed that the August 13 notification provides for reservation covering nearly 75% of seats across Rajasthan's 41 districts for women and SC/ST/OBC categories. The petition also alleged that over 32 of the 41 Zila Parishad chairperson posts have been reserved, which it claimed crosses the 50% ceiling....