Lok Sabha polls: Maratha quota, infrastructure key issues in Maharashtra
reservation demand, big-ticket infrastructure development and farmers' problems would be prominent issues during the ensuing Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra, which elects the second highest number of members of the Lower House, after Uttar Pradesh. (Full Schedule)
Lok Sabha polls in Maharashtra will be held in five phases on April 19, April 26, May 7, May 13 and May 20. Counting of votes will be held on June 4. The Maratha reservation demand has dominated the state's political landscape since the Supreme Court struck down the 2018 Act of the state which provided quota in education and jobs to the Maratha community.
Opposition parties have been demanding that the Union government bring in a constitutional amendment to scrap the 50 per cent cap on reservations. Activist Manoj Jarange demanded that the entire Maratha community should be given quota in the OBC category by identifying them as Kunbi.
Kunbis, an agrarian community, fall in the OBC category. But Chhagan Bhujbal, a senior minister from the NCP and prominent OBC leader, opposed the demand, stating that Marathas should not get a share in the OBC quota. Bhujbal took a defiant stand even though the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena-BJP-NCP government was sympathetic to the quota demand. It set up the Sandeep Shinde committee to examine pre-1967 Kunbi records.
Jarange has maintained that Marathas and Kunbis are socially and culturally very close. Another of his demands was that if a Maratha person could produce a record showing that he or she can be identified
