With Lok Sabha elections just around the corner, the old ghosts are coming back to haunt BJP and Shiv Sena alliance in Maharashtra. The Maratha Kranti Morcha on Sunday accused the state government of not keeping their promise on quota reservation and have warned of voting against the BJP and Shiv Sena in the Lok Sabha elections.
According to Mumbai Mirror, the Maratha Kranti Morcha supporters in Mumbai held a meeting on Sunday at Dadar in which they expressed their anger over the government’s indifferent attitude which, they said, resulted in the matter being stuck in the high court.
Virendra Pawar from Maratha Kranti Morcha told the leading daily, “The community is not happy with the way BJP-Shiv Sena government has dealt with the issue of reservation. Despite their promise, the matter is stuck in court. Many of our students, job aspirants have lost the opportunity because of that. On August 9, the government made many promises but fulfilled none. They could not even build hostels for the students of the Maratha community. The cases against the youths lodged during the protests have not been withdrawn.”
During the meeting, the Maratha Kranti Morcha supporters also said that they would not want to support the BJP-Shiv Sena candidates at least in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. The Mumbai chapter has decided to convene a state-level meeting of all Maratha groups and take a final decision regarding not voting for the BJP-Shiv Sena.
In the meanwhile, the Maharashtra Kranti Sena (MKS), a recently formed pro-Maratha political outfit, on Sunday joined the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance in the state ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. MKS founder president Suresh Patil was one of the leaders who earlier spearheaded the agitation to seek reservation for the Maratha community in government jobs and education.
On November 29 last year, the Maharashtra legislature passed a bill granting 16 percent reservation in education and government jobs for the Maratha community under the socially and educationally backward category (SEBC). This 16 percent quota will be in addition to the existing 52 percent reservation for other groups, taking the total percentage in the state to 68 percent.
