Marathas

Marathas are a community in Maharashtra which constitute about 31% of the state population and that is no way you can call them a minority community, and they are demanding reservations in jobs and other benefits which are allowed for other SC/ST & OBC communities. Marathas call them the descendants of great warrior Shivaji Maharaj, who through out his life time had fought Moghuls and other Muslim ruler of that era. Suddenly for last 3 years they have started demands for the reservations and they are asking  16% reservations.  Till few years back there were no talks of reservations by  this community, I think the  Maratha community got the idea after Patels community started  agitating for the reservations in the neighbouring state Gujarat, where they were about 20% of state’s population.

The problem for Gujarat and Maharashtra is same, because as per law and SC judgement no state can have reservations more than 50% collectively for different communities. Presently  reservations in both the state is almost touching 50%, and if Gujarat agrees for Patel’s demands and Maharashtra for Maratha’s demand then total reservations will exceed 50% and that is not allowed by law. Secondly if they agree for these demands then they will have to cut the reservations already allotted to SC/ST and OBC. That will result in agitations  by the communities who will have less reservations now, and that will not be accepted by them.

The Marathas  demand looks to be very political as  before Devendra Phadnavis  of BJP became CM of Maharashtra, the state generally had CM  from the Maratha community only, that is the politics of Maharashtra.. Starting from 1960, when state was formed there have been CMs mostly from Maratha community only, few known names are Yashwantrao Chavan,  Shankarrao Chavan (twice), Vasant Dada Patil ( 3 times), Sharad Pawar (4 times) Baba Saheb Bhosle , Narayan Rane, Vilasrao Deshmukh, Sushil Kumar Shinde (twice) Ashok Chavan and Prthiraj Chavan. The state was formed in 1960, and in its existence of 58 years about, about for 40 years there was CM from Maratha community, and from 1999 to 2014 all the CMs were from this community. We never heard any demand from Maratha community for the reservations during last 15 years when there was Maratha CM. This demand started only after  BJP started ruling the state, and their CM is from the non Maratha community.  So the problem is more of a political nature rather than a genuine one, as if this community has suddenly gone financially bankrupt and they want the reservations.

Even if you consider the present strength of Maharashtra Assembly and Council, which has a total strength of  288 (MLAs) plus 78(MLCs)= 366 . Out of this more than 45 % ie 169 members are from the Maratha community. The Party wise break up is Congress 29, BJP 53, Shiv Sena 44 and NCP 43. So a community which is having more than 45% representation in the state legislature can not be called economically backward community.The real problem is that   Marathas think it is their birth right to rule the Maharashtra, as Nehru/Gandhi family thinks of ruling the country. Presently  Marathas from Congress and NCP feel that they have no chance of coming back to power considering the performance of BJP govt, therefore all the Maratha leaders from Congress and NCP are instigating this issue. The Marathas  in BJP can not do any thing on this issue as they out numbered by non Marathas, and Shiv Sena is a party which is controlled by Thackrey family and  they only want to criticise Phadnavis govt for their own selfish motto.

So if the Maratha leaders outside and within govt feels that Marathas deserve  the reservations they why don’t they resign their seats and force Governor to dissolve the assembly and fight the next assembly election on this issue and win the election and form the govt and then give the reservation to Marathas.  But they will not do any such thing because they know in their heart that they also can not go against SC judgement, unless Central govt enacts new law to raise the percentage of reservations.

In the end it is all dirty politics, in which general public is suffering. Secondly in the yesterday’s Maratha morcha in Mumbai, if you have seen TV clippings you would have seen many Muslims walking in the morcha, and I fail to understand how they are connected with this issue, or whatever crowd we saw yesterday to show Maratha’s strength was a paid crowd.

So what you say my friends.

Awaiting for your feed backs/views/comments on this issue.