With the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), sensing an opportunity to corner the ruling Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government over the Maratha quota imbroglio, have decided to join quota agitation. Co-ordinators of Maratha outfits are wary of the saffron party's participation.
A number of community leaders are fretting that the BJP's participation could give an unwarranted political twist to the quota drama and derail the community’s efforts to secure reservation.
Maratha community leader from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Maruti Bhapkar, has said that instead of planning future agitations, the BJP leaders in Maharashtra must try to use their influence with the Centre to ensure that the community gets justice.
“We do not want their protests against the ruling MVA at this stage…after the Supreme Court’s disappointing verdict, the onus now clearly is on the BJP-ruled Centre to convince the apex court and ensure that Marathas get reservation. So, the State BJP leadership would do better to use their influence to get the Centre to throw their weight on this problem,” Mr. Bhapkar said.
He rued that till now, the reservation issue had been sacrificed at the altar of regional power politics.
“The problem is political parties are hungry to take credit…our agitations for reservations have already cost the lives of 42 youth. They are extremely demoralized by the Supreme Court’s verdict. We do not want the BJP to stir up the cauldron further,” said Mr. Bhapkar, who was earlier associated with both the Shiv Sena and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
He further urged Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar, consider a community strongman, to actively look into this issue.
“Despite being such a tall community leader, Mr. Pawar’s behaviour over the issue has been guarded to the point of insensitivity. As the architect of the MVA alliance, he has an obligation to resolve this matter…a dark cloud hangs over the future of lakhs of poor Maratha youth as a result of the court’s judgment. It is time politicians stop using the community to seek political mileage,” Mr. Bhapkar said, observing that the only course of action now was to sort out the issue in a legal manner rather than resorting to street protests.
Vinod Patil, a coordinator of the ‘Maratha Kranti Morcha’ which has been spearheading the quota agitation, said that a review petition had already been filed by him in the Apex court challenging the majority view of the Constitution Bench that only the Centre, and not the State, had the power under the 102nd Constitution Amendment to identify and list Socially and Educationally Backward Classes.
“Now that the Centre has come into the picture, it should not sit in the fence but take an active part in resolving this issue. Furthermore, State BJP leaders must follow the matter up with the Centre and support the State government instead of indulging in slanging matches with them,” he said.
On Tuesday, parallel meetings were held on the issue by both the cabinet sub-committee on the quota issue headed by Public Works Department (PWD) Minister Ashok Chavan as well as the oppistion BJP, in which top state leaders including Devendra Fadnavis and Chandrakant Patil participated.
The state government has already appointed a seven-member committee headed by former Chief Justice Dilip Bhosale to study the Supreme Court order cancelling the Maratha reservation in Maharashtra. His report is expected to be submitted by the end of this month after which the State government would deliberate the future course of action.