Bombay HC to look into Maratha reservations

Shiv Kumar
Tribune News Service
Mumbai, November 19

The issue of granting reservations in educational institutions and government jobs for the Maratha community in Maharashtra has now landed before the courts.

The Bombay High Court is expected to hear several petitions on the matter on Wednesday. A petitioner, Vinod Patil who was seeking reservations for the Maratha community, mentioned the matter before Judge B P Dharmadhikari of the Bombay High Court and sought an urgent hearing.

The court has posted the matter for hearing on Wednesday.

Petitions for and against reservations for the Marathas were filed before the Bombay High Court in 2014 and 2015 shortly after the Congress-NCP government issued an ordinance allowing 16 per cent reservations for the community. The HC had passed an interim order staying reservations for the Marathas on the grounds that the limit of 50 per cent reservations ordered by the Supreme Court had been breached.

Subsequently, Patil and others had moved the court seeking reservations for the community on the grounds that most of its members were socio-economically and educationally backward. The HC had then asked the State Backward Class Commission to issue a report on the status of the Maratha community and whether its members needed reservations.

With the Commission recommending reservation for the Marathas, the Maharashtra assembly is poised to pass the legislation granting quotas in educational instutitions and government jobs on the grounds that the community is sociologically, economically and educationally backward.

The High Court today asked the Maharashtra government to file its response to the petition seeking reservations for the Maratha community along with the report of the State Backward Class Commission in the matter.