Maharashtra BJP unit on Thursday informed that the party will not let any local body elections take place until the issue of other backward classes (OBC) reservations gets resolved.
Addressing the reporters, Maharashtra BJP president Chandrakant Patil said, "BJP will not let any local body elections take place until the issue of OBC reservation is resolved." Earlier, on June 8, Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray and deputy CM Ajit Pawar met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi to discuss the Maratha quota issue and Cyclone Tauktae relief measures. "They discussed issues like Maratha and Other Backward Classes reservation and Cyclone Tauktae relief," home minister Dilip Walse Patil told the media.
In May this year, the Supreme Court stayed the state's reservation of 27 per cent of seats in local bodies for OBCs. In view of this, Thackeray requested PM Modi to take relevant data from the 2011 Census in consideration and to include OBC as a separate category in the 2021 Census. OBCs, Thackeray said, should be given constitutional status, the same as Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, rather than remaining statutory.
Speaking further on the upcoming local body elections, Patil said, "There's no possibility of BJP-MNS alliance because the latter's views about other states are unacceptable to us. Despite the difference of opinion, it's important to meet each othe,r so I will meet him (MNS chief Raj Thackeray) tomorrow." This news pours in amidst the upcoming local (civic) body polls that will be held in 2022 in the cities of Maharashtra.
