SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989

Explanation

All three pairs are correctly matched. Article 341 of the Constitution vests the power in the President to notify Scheduled Castes for each State or Union Territory, and Parliament retains the power to include or exclude groups from such notifications by law — this is a constitutionally defined two-step mechanism. Article 16(4) permits the State to make special provisions for reservation in public employment for backward classes that are not adequately represented — it is the principal constitutional basis for OBC reservations in services. Paragraph 3 of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order, 1950 — issued under Article 341 — explicitly bars persons professing a religion other than Hinduism, Sikhism, or Buddhism from being deemed members of a Scheduled Caste. This is the provision the Supreme Court relied upon to hold that conversion to Islam results in immediate loss of SC status, since the legal identity of a Scheduled Caste is inseparable from the religion professed. The Indra Sawhney judgment further clarified that reservation under Articles 15(4) and 16(4) attaches to a constitutionally identified class, not to an individual as a personal transferable entitlement — so pre-conversion backwardness cannot be automatically carried into a new religious community.

Explanation

Under the Centrally Sponsored Scheme implementing the Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955 and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, the Centre provides financial assistance to State Governments and UT Administrations — this is the standard federal architecture of centrally sponsored schemes where the Centre funds but States execute. The scheme is implemented by the respective State Governments and UT Administrations, and the responsibility for its effective implementation rests with them — not with the Central Government. Statement 1 is therefore correct, and Statement 2 is incorrect because it inverts the actual locus of implementation responsibility.