  Sanctioned by its constitution, India is home to the world's most
comprehensive affirmative action program, where historically discriminated
groups are protected with vertical reservations implemented as "set asides,"
and other disadvantaged groups are protected with horizontal reservations
implemented as "minimum guarantees." A mechanism mandated by the Supreme Court
in 1995 suffers from important anomalies, triggering countless litigations in
India. Foretelling a recent reform correcting the flawed mechanism, we propose
the 2SMG mechanism that resolves all anomalies, and characterize it with
desiderata reflecting laws of India. Subsequently rediscovered with a high
court judgment and enforced in Gujarat, 2SMG is also endorsed by Saurav Yadav
v. State of UP (2020), in a Supreme Court ruling that rescinded the flawed
mechanism. While not explicitly enforced, 2SMG is indirectly enforced for an
important subclass of applications in India, because no other mechanism
satisfies the new mandates of the Supreme Court.
