State forms committee to collate empirical data of OBCs

The Maharashtra government set up a five-member committee under former chief secretary Jayant Banthia to collate the empirical data of the Other Backward Classes (OBCs), state OBC welfare minister Vijay Wadettiwar said on Thursday

The Maharashtra government set up a five-member committee under former chief secretary Jayant Banthia to collate the empirical data of the Other Backward Classes (OBCs), state OBC welfare minister Vijay Wadettiwar said on Thursday. The minister also said that the government will take up the issue of a caste-based census in the state cabinet.

OBC welfare minister Vijay Wadettiwar said that the government will take up the issue of a caste-based census in the state cabinet. HT File

Wadettiwar was responding to a starred question by the leader of opposition in the Council, Pravin Darekar, on the delay in releasing funds to the OBC commission for a caste-based census. The minister said, “We have decided to set up a committee for collating the empirical data of the OBCs. It is being formed today under former chief secretary Jayant Banthia, former FDA commissioner Mahesh Zagade, Shalini Bhagat from Tata Institute of Social Sciences, and some other officials, including Naresh Geete.” Banthia is also a former census commissioner.

Legislator Kapil Patil sought a caste-based census contending that the state cannot establish the OBCs’ political backwardness without it.

To this, Wadettiwar said, “The terms of reference for the commission were set for collating the empirical data to establish political backwardness of the OBCs... However, I will take up the issue of a caste-wise census in the state cabinet.”

The minister blamed the former member secretary of the backward class commission, DD Deshmukh, for the delay in providing data to the commission. He added that he wrote to the state chief secretary seeking removal of Deshmukh.