In mid-January, Arun Hegde travelled 220 km from his village in Maharashtra’s Nanded district to Antarvali in Jalna to affix a protest rally by Marathas.
The farmer carried massive sacks of sugar, rice, tea, garments and bedsheets.
From Antarvali, Hegde joined the entourage of Maratha activist Manoj Jarange-Patil – a large procession of vehicles, tempos, tractors and automobiles – which lined one other 400 km over 5 days and reached Navi Mumbai on January 25.
Their last vacation spot was Mumbai’s Azad Maidan the place they deliberate an indefinite protest to demand reservation for the Maratha neighborhood.
Hegde slept on a bedsheet unfold by the roadside at night time, and cooked meals with others on the highway within the day. He was ready for a protracted haul, however to his shock it took solely a day of protest on the Chhatrapati Shivaji Chowk in Vashi to spur the Maharashtra authorities into motion.
By the night time of January 26, the federal government had agreed to all their calls for and issued a draft notification, promising Marathas, who can show their Kunbi lineage, reservation underneath the Different Backward Lessons or OBC quota.
Kunbis, an agrarian Maratha sub-caste, turned eligible for OBC reservation in 2004.
Hegde was dwelling by the following day, having made up his thoughts to vote for Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde, who break up from Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena in 2022 and fashioned a authorities with the Bharatiya Janata Occasion.
Shinde’s determination left a number of authorized questions unanswered, however with solely months to go for the Lok Sabha elections in a key election state, it’s seen as a approach to placate the politically influential Maratha neighborhood – which, by some estimates, accounts for 33% of state inhabitants.
However, analysts say, the transfer will not be with out dangers. It could possibly alienate the OBCs, who kind 38% of state inhabitants – and are extensively believed to be supporters of the BJP, part of the ruling alliance in Maharashtra.
For instance, in Nanded district itself, as Hegde and different Marathas rejoiced, there was disquiet amongst OBC communities.
Mahendra Demgunde, district president of the OBC Jan Morcha, advised Scroll that individuals have began panicking in villages about having to share the present reservation with Marathas. “I obtained calls from academics in authorities faculties who fear whether or not members of our neighborhood will get jobs in faculties and schools sooner or later,” he stated.
Behind the anxiousness is the distinction in affect between the 2 teams.
The Marathas are a politically dominant, landowning neighborhood of Maharashtra, although sure sections are more and more underneath stress as agricultural incomes shrink. In 2021, the state authorities’s determination to offer 16% reservation to the neighborhood in larger training and authorities jobs was struck down by the Supreme Court docket, which reasoned that it was not a backward neighborhood.
Essentially the most strident voice of opposition to the notification has come from inside the Maharashtra authorities – Chhagan Bhujbal, one of many state’s main OBC leaders, and a minister within the Shinde authorities has termed the reservation for Marathas with Kunbi lineage as a “backdoor entry” into OBC quota.
Bhujbal is now mobilising your complete neighborhood for a collection of protests.
The door to OBC quota
Previous makes an attempt to grant Marathas reservation have repeatedly come up in opposition to one impediment – their relative affluence and empowerment in comparison with different communities within the state, whether or not OBCs or the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.
To get round that, Jarange-Patil proposed that each one Marathas be recognized as Kunbis underneath Different Backward Lessons, or OBCs. However, as Scroll reported earlier, this can be a tough reclassification to drag off, for authorized causes in addition to a fancy caste historical past.
Kunbis are a largely agrarian neighborhood with small land holdings and low incomes, unfold throughout Maharashtra, Karnataka, Goa, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh.
A few centuries in the past, the Nizam rulers of Marathwada recognized Kunbis as a sub-caste of the Marathas and issued them identification paperwork.
In 2004, Marathas who had these Kunbi data had been included in Maharashtra’s checklist of Different Backward Lessons and given reservation.
Giving in to Jarange-Patil’s calls for, the Maharashtra authorities, within the draft notification issued on January 26, allowed the ‘sage-soyare’ – a Marathi time period for household tree – or blood relations of Kunbis to assert reservation.
This may permit an individual with proof of Kunbi lineage to vouch {that a} blood relative on his or her paternal facet is a part of his or her bigger kin group. Primarily based on this, the federal government will present the particular person’s relations a Kunbi certificates. Such certificates may also be issued for Marathas who’re married to companions with official Kunbi data.
The neighborhood has demanded that the federal government arrange camps on the district and taluka ranges to assist them declare kinship with Kunbi relations. For now, the federal government has agreed to this demand.
In the meantime, Maharashtra can also be conducting a hasty caste-based census – its deadline was January 31– to collate knowledge on financial backwardness of Maratha neighborhood. A number of previous commissions have refused to determine Marathas as backward.
The census’s high quality is questionable, these inside the authorities have admitted. Many households have refused to share their knowledge, stated officers conducting the survey, and lots of Marathas could give biased knowledge in an effort to painting themselves as poor, stated Prakash Shendge, president of OBC Jan Morcha, an organisation that represents the neighborhood.
A Brihanmumbai Municipal Company official, who is part of the crew conducting the survey, advised Scroll that the survey has questions on loans taken, automobiles and homes owned by an individual, and in the event that they really feel they’re excluded from authorities alternatives attributable to their neighborhood. “There isn’t any approach to authenticate their solutions on loans, home or automotive,” the official stated.
One other government-led committee, the Justice Sandeep Shinde committee, is trying into methods to offer Kunbi certification to Marathas in Marathwada.
The demand for reservation is strongest within the Vidarbha and Marathwada areas, the place the agrarian disaster has left a number of communities impoverished.
Whereas most Marathas in Vidarbha have Kunbi certificates, many in Marathwada don’t.
A member of the committee advised Scroll they had been hardly capable of finding Kunbi data of Marathas in Marathwada. “The federal government’s determination to determine sage-soyare as Kunbi will assist lakhs get the OBC quota,” the member stated. “In any other case there isn’t any different manner.”
OBC protest
A number of OBC leaders Scroll spoke to stated they’re gearing up for political and authorized battles.
Already a petition difficult the federal government’s notification has been filed within the Bombay Excessive Court docket. Extra petitions are anticipated to observe.
“We’ll struggle this determination of the federal government,” stated Shendge.
He stated that they plan to maneuver the Bombay Excessive Court docket to problem the federal government declare that it has to this point discovered 57 lakh Kunbi certificates.
“The federal government initially stated 54 lakh Kunbi data have been discovered,” stated Shendge. “Inside a number of days, that determine rose to 57 lakh. We need to know from the place these many data have been discovered.”
In Marathwada, solely 28,000 Kunbi data have been discovered, he stated.
Shendge stated the federal government’s determination to chill out the standards for getting a Kunbi certificates will convey a big inhabitants underneath reservation. “This might profit virtually your complete neighborhood,” he stated.
He questioned the necessity to label Marathas as backward. “A number of commissions have confirmed that Marathas are in truth politically robust.”
The information bear out Shengde’s assertion. To take only one instance, within the 2019 Lok Sabha election, of the 48 seats, 21 had been received by Marathas, 4 by Kunbis and 13 by OBC candidates. The remaining had been received by Muslims, Brahmins, SC and ST candidates.
In addition to entry to jobs and training, OBC leaders additionally concern that the choice may eat into the political beneficial properties made by the neighborhood. “If Marathas come underneath OBC, even our illustration in gram panchayat elections may scale back,” Demgunde, the OBC Jan Morcha chief from Nanded, stated. In 2022, the Supreme Court docket allowed 27% reservation for OBCs in native physique elections in Maharashtra, although it has not been applied to this point.
In Osmanabad, about 1,000 OBC members will shave their heads as a mark of insurrection in opposition to the federal government on February 1.
Pravin Gadhave, chief of OBC Mahasabha in Maharashtra, stated they don’t seem to be against reservation for Marathas. “So long as the OBC quota will not be diluted. If the federal government will increase our quota by 10%, the neighborhood may have no drawback in sharing the reservation,” he stated.
Presently, Maharashtra’s 62% reservation is carved out into 13% for Scheduled Castes, 7% for Scheduled Tribes, 19% for OBCs, and 10% for the economically weaker part. The remaining 13% is shared by particular backward lessons, communities categorized as Vimukta Jati, and nomadic tribes.
Political ramifications
With the Lok Sabha and Meeting elections developing, will the OBC anger price the BJP in Maharashtra?
Prakash Ambedkar, Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi chief and a member of the INDIA alliance, predicted a shift within the voting sample of the OBCs within the elections. “The OBCs should not going to vote for Marathas,” he advised Scroll.
Whereas Ambedkar’s occasion has not opposed advantages for the Marathas, he has argued for a separate reservation quota for the neighborhood. “Inki thali aur unki thali alag honi chahiye,” he stated. ‘They need to not should share from the identical plate.’
By asserting reservation for Marathas, Ambedkar stated, Eknath Shinde has emerged because the tallest Maratha chief, “He’ll get 100% of the poor Maratha votes.”
However that additionally means BJP could lose its voter base within the OBC neighborhood, he added.
“BJP loses out in each instances,” he stated – if Marathas get reservation and if they don’t.
Harish Wankhede, school at Jawaharlal Nehru College’s Centre for Political Research, agreed that Shinde’s determination will assist him consolidate the votes of the working-class Marathas, if not the higher class.
Shinde, Wankhede stated, has additionally purchased time until the Lok Sabha elections. “He has saved his promise of reservation. However he is aware of this can ultimately result in a judicial scrutiny and the courtroom will query the constitutional validity of reservation,” he stated.
The BJP seems to have performed protected, Wankhede famous, by letting Shinde take all choices. Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis didn’t publicly contain himself within the negotiations with the Maratha neighborhood. Solely two senior BJP leaders, Girish Mahajan and Mangal Prabhat Lodha, had been current when Patil broke his quick.
“The BJP largely has an OBC voter base within the state,” Wankhede stated. “The subsequent day, Fadnavis stated the OBC quota won’t be affected. BJP is ensuring any anger, in anyway, is directed at Shinde and never on the BJP. That can also be why BJP will not be overtly supporting Shinde’s determination.”
However Ambedkar contested whether or not the BJP can distance itself from Shinde’s name. It is also argued that the BJP is a part of the ruling alliance and did nothing to safeguard OBC curiosity, he added.
Shengde, the OBC Jan Morcha president, advised Scroll that the neighborhood will rally behind candidates from their neighborhood within the coming elections – and never vote for Marathas, irrespective of which occasion places them up.
In Osmanabad’s Dharashiv, OBC Jan Morcha member Dipak Jadhav stated “now we have been let down by our leaders”, referring to Shinde who’s a Maratha and Fadnavis who’s a Brahmin.
Demgunde, the OBC chief from Nanded, stated the Maharashtra cupboard presently has 11 Marathas and 9 OBC ministers. “We need to improve our illustration within the authorities. Solely then we are able to assert our rights,” he stated.
