"We are not against Maratha reservation, but cannot ignore OBCs": Chhagan Bhujbal

Maharashtra Minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Chhagan Bhujbal has asserted that the government is not against the Maratha reservation, however, the Other Backward Class (OBC) community should not be "ignored".

"We are not against Maratha reservation, but cannot ignore OBCs": Chhagan Bhujbal "We are not against the Maratha reservation. However, the OBC community should not be ignored. We should maintain peace and discuss this", Bhujbal told reporters in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar in Maharashtra.

He said, "the state government wants to provide reservations to Marathas and OBCs separately". Earlier this month, Manoj Jarange Patil suspended his indefinite fast and set a deadline for the Maharashtra government to accept the community's demands.

He gave the state government one month until July 13 to meet the community's demands. Jarange has been demanding reservations for the Marathas community under the OBC category for several years.

Earlier, Patil said that if the Maratha reservation is not provided this time, he will contest the Maharashtra Assembly elections that are expected to take place in October later this year. He criticized both the ruling Mahyuti tripartite alliance and the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi for "doing nothing" regarding the Maratha reservation.

"We have been misled by the state government of Eknath Shinde. Mahayuti has not given us Maratha reservation...When Maha Vikas Aghadi was in power, they did nothing for the Maratha reservation," he had said. In February this year, the Maharashtra government, during a special assembly session, approved a Bill to extend 10 per cent reservation to the Marathas, based on a report submitted by the Maharashtra Backward Class Commission (MBCC). (ANI)

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