Maharashtra to amend laws for OBC reservation for local body polls

State food and civil supplies minister Chhagan Bhujbal said the decision on OBC reservation was taken in view of the bypolls in six district councils (zilla parishads) declared by the state election commission on October 5

The Maharashtra government has decided to promulgate an ordinance to make amendment to two legislations to provide reservation to the other backward classes (OBC) in local bodies without breaching the 50% reservation cap mandated by the Supreme Court. The decision was taken in the state cabinet meeting held on Wednesday.

On March 4, the Supreme Court ruled that the reservation in favour of the OBC in local bodies should not result in exceeding the 50% cap in reservation quota mandated by it. (HT PHOTO)

State food and civil supplies minister Chhagan Bhujbal said the decision was taken in view of the bypolls in six district councils (zilla parishads) declared by the state election commission on October 5. With the move, they will be able to secure 90% seats of the OBC community in the local bodies as in some districts, their seats are going to be reduced, said Bhujbal. He also added that their fight for the OBC reservation in Apex Court will continue.

According to an estimation prepared by the state government, of the total 5,200 seats reserved for the OBC community in the state, around 4,500 seats can be saved by bringing the amendment. HT on August 28 reported that the state is likely to bring in an amendment to the legislations to restore OBC reservation in local bodies, without violating the 50% ceiling imposed by the Apex Court. As of now, the state rural development department will issue an ordinance to bring in an amendment to two legislations — Maharashtra Zilla Parishads and Panchayat Samitis Act, 1961 and Maharashtra Village Panchayat Act for zilla parishads, panchayat samiti and gram panchayats. A similar ordinance was issued by the erstwhile Devendra Fadnavis government on July 31, 2019.

The functioning of local bodies in the state is covered with the help of five legislations. The other three are — The Mumbai Municipal Corporation Act, Maharashtra Municipal Corporations Act and Maharashtra Municipal Councils, Nagar Panchayats and. (iii). Industrial Townships Act. The amendment in the above three acts can be brought by the state urban development department.

“The urban development department will bring in the amendments for the other local bodies in the next cabinet meeting and a decision will be taken accordingly,” said a senior minister. “Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and a few other states too have made such an amendment. We also admit that the reservation quota limit of 50% will not be violated while holding the elections of local bodies. The same was also discussed in all-party meetings called by the chief minister twice. However, even after this, seats of the OBC community will dip by 10% to 15% in local bodies,” Bhujbal said after the state cabinet meeting at Sahyadri guest house.

The legislation for the local bodies in Maharashtra provides reservation to the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities based on their population in those particular bodies. In case of the OBC community, they were getting direct 27% reservation as their population data is not available and their last census was conducted in 1931. Consequently, there are many districts where the combined reservation of all the communities — SC, ST and OBC — exceeds 50% cap.

After the new amendment, the SC and ST communities will continue to get the reservation quota based on their population but the OBC community will get the remaining within the 50% ceiling. It means in tribal populated districts such as Palghar and Nandurbar, the OBC community will not get any reservation because their ST community has a sizable population.

Tribals come under the Scheduled Tribe (ST) community.

On March 4, the Supreme Court ruled that the reservation in favour of the OBC in local bodies should not result in exceeding the 50% cap in reservation quota mandated by it. It has directed the state government to appoint a dedicated commission for collecting empirical data, based on which, the reservation quota of the community be fixed and also allowed the state election commission to hold local bodies polls without having reservations for OBCs.

Quota in ST districts

The state cabinet on Wednesday revised the reservation in eight Scheduled Tribe-dominated districts for direct recruitment in Class 3 and Class 4 jobs in the districts. Earlier, since the tribal population was high in these areas the quota in jobs given to ST, Vimukta Jati (VJ), Nomadic Tribe (NT), etc was increased, while quota for OBC was reduced. The decision on Wednesday increased quota for OBC in jobs, without hurting the reservation for ST, VJ, NT, etc, state minister Vijay Wadettiwar said. The OBC will get more quota for Class 3 and Class 4 jobs in these districts, including Palghar, Nashik, Dhule, Nandurbar, Yavatmal, Chandrapur, Gadhchiroli, and Raigad, the minister said.

The tribal population in the state gets 7% reservation in jobs in Maharashtra, but in these districts were given reservation between 15% and 24% in 2001, an official said. “After Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) or PESA came into force here in 2001, the ST reservation for Class 3 and Class 4 jobs was increased. In that, the quota was reduced only from the OBCs. The stand of the sub-committee was that if reservation is being reduced then it must be done equally for others as well,” said Wadettiwar.

“Today, the OBC reservation in Gadhchiroli was increased to 17% from 6%, 19% in Chandrapur from 9%, 15% in Nashik, Nandurbar, Palghar and Dhule,” he said.

“The state government took the decision only after BJP held statewide protests,” said Keshav Upadhye, spokesperson of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Earlier during the day the party held protests at Thane, Pune, Aurangabad, Nagpur, Solapur, Jalgaon, Kolhapur and Nashik across the state against the MVA government. It had declared to hold statewide protests at 1,000 places.