Vinod Tawade, the state Education Minister, said they are confident that the affidavit submitted by them before the court will hold ground
After undergoing a two year long exercise to compile a 2,800 page affidavit to justify reservation for Marathas, top sources in the government claim the department is wary about holding its stand before the court. The government has already started to explore other options through which the Maratha community can be given benefits of reservations.
“The top lawyers fighting the case are not satisfied with the documents collected by the department to prove its case. In a recent meeting with Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Education Minister Vinod Tawade, the legal team has recommended thinking of other options like including the Marathas’s kunbi clan under OBCs or reservation of certain sections of the community on economical grounds,” said a senior government official.
Vinod Tawade, the state Education Minister, said they are confident that the affidavit submitted by them before the court will hold ground. “ We are waiting for the January hearing. Our aim is to ensure that Marathas get reservation,” Tawade told DNA.
The department filed a 2,800-page to affidavit on December 7 to justify reservation for Marathas as legal and that it did not violate constitutional provisions. The affidavit has cited reasons like farmer suicides in the state being higher amongst the Maratha community to back its claim that the community is socially and educationally backward, and thus in need of reservation.
The affidavit comprises documents collected from the archive department and belong to pre-Independence times including constitutional notes of Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar and references to earlier dynasties to show that Marathas were described all along as a ‘backward’ community in need of reservation.
It has also attacked the Public Interest Litigations (PILs) challenging the reservation introduced by the state in 2014 on legal points. “The PIL wrongly interpreted the Supreme Court ruling to submit that a state cannot exceed reservation by 50 per cent,” it said. The judgement put no bar on reservation and said it may exceed if exceptional circumstances are shown and which are covered under Articles 15 and 16 of the Constitution, said the Maharashtra government.
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