The agitation for Maratha reservation boiled over on October 26 after a 25-year-old youth allegedly took his own life in Maharashtra’s Hingoli district while quota activists vandalised vehicles belonging to a Mumbai-based lawyer who had been opposing Maratha reservation.
The youth, identified as one Krishna Kalyankar, was found in a farm in Hingoli’s Kalamnuri tehsil, said the police.
The authorities said they had retrieved a note left behind by Mr. Kalyankar in which the deceased said he was taking the extreme step so that Marathas were quickly granted reservation in jobs and education. A team of the Hingoli police reached the spot and sent the deceased person’s body to a government hospital for post-mortem examination.
A number of members from the community have taken their lives during the Maratha quota agitation despite quota activist Manoj Jarange Patil, the most prominent face of the agitation who is again on an indefinite hunger strike, repeatedly urging restraint upon community members.
In the second incident, three activists from the Maratha Kranti Morcha, an outfit spearheading the agitation, vandalised cars belonging to Mumbai-based lawyer Gunaratna Sadavarte outside the latter’s residence in Parel.
According to sources, the vandals chanted pro-reservation slogans after damaging Mr. Sadavarte’s property.
Advocate Sadavarte, who is a known opponent of granting reservation to the Maratha community, lashed out at Mr. Jarange Patil and demanded his immediate arrest by the State government. The latter, however, disclaimed any knowledge of the incident and appealed to community members to carry out the agitation peacefully and not resort to any violence.
Speaking to reporters after the incident, an angry Mr. Sadavarte said, “I am not going to be silenced by threats from Maratha activists. I want to ask Jarange Patil, ‘Is this your peaceful agitation’?”
Claiming he and his family had been receiving death threats from quota agitators, Mr. Sadavarte said, “I will keep fight for the rights of the open category students till my last breath. I will not permit any divisions on the basis of caste. Let merit prevail.”
The police detained three quota activists who were later released on bail.
Speaking in Jalna, Mr. Jarange Patil said the Maratha community did not support any form of violence while carrying out its agitation.
“I am not even aware of this incident. I am merely fighting for the rights of poor Marathas. They have realised that no one, be it any political party or the government, stands with them in fighting for a quota,” said the activist.
Maratha community leader Vinod Patil, convenor of the Maratha Kranti Morcha, said that while he condemned anyone taking the law into his own hands, Mr. Sadavarte had been calculatedly hurting the sentiments of the Maratha community with his provocative remarks.
“I would appeal to Maratha youths not to break the law and fight the quota battle within the legal framework. However, the community has been upset by Mr. Sadavarte’s strident anti-Maratha comments and the attack on his vehicles is a manifestation of that anger,” said Mr. Vinod Patil.
Minister Shambhuraj Desai, who is from CM Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena faction, said there was a pressing need to maintain social harmony in the wake of the Maratha agitation.
“CM Eknath Shinde has repeatedly assured the community of a quota. The government has not been slack on this matter. So, I urge restraint upon quota activists while appealing to people not to make provocative comments against any community,” he said.
This is not the first time that Mr. Sadavarte has courted trouble for his opposition to a quota for the Marathas: Back in 2014, when the then Congress-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) government had issued an ordinance to reserve 16% seats for the Marathas in education and government jobs, Mr. Sadavarte had opposed it by moving the Bombay High Court.
He had again filed a petition in 2020 in the Bombay HC after the State government (then led by the BJP) had passed a Bill granting 16% reservation to Marathas in government jobs and education.
In the interim, Mr. Sadavarte has claimed of having received several death threats, and on one occasion, was even assaulted outside the court by a pro-quota mob.
