On September 9, the Supreme Court directed that no quota will be granted to people of the Maratha community in education and jobs in the state this year and referred the hearing on a batch of plea challenging the constitutional validity of a Maharashtra law granting Maratha reservation in education and jobs to a larger bench.
After the stay by the Supreme Court the Maratha Arakshan Action Samiti (MAAS) has called for state-wide bandh on October 10.
However, Rajya Sabha Members of the Parliament (MPs) Chhatrapati Sambhaji Raje has clarified that he does not support this bandh. He also questioned, Is it going to benefit anyone by calling for Maharashtra bandh?
The Maratha outfit has blamed the state government with deliberately going easy over the reservation issue. This time, we want to make sure that the government keeps its promises. We are giving them time till October 9 to clarify its decision. Failing this, we will stage a complete shutdown in Maharashtra on October 10, said a Maratha morcha worker.
Meanwhile, the state government has scrapped its earlier decision to give the benefit of 10 per cent quota for the Economically Backward Section (EBC). The cabinet dropped it from the minutes, following strong opposition from the Maratha community, as they insisted that the state government should make all efforts for the restoration of 12 per cent quota in education and 13 per cent in government jobs under the Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC) Act, 2018, which was recently stayed by the Supreme Court.