MUMBAI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed that reservation benefits should be extended to Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in local body elections in Maharashtra.
The court accepted the empirical data collated by the government-appointed Bhantia Commission.
In March, the then Maha Vikas Aghadi government had announced a committee led by former chief secretary Jayant Banthia for collating empirical data on the OBCs following the top court’s refusal to
accept an interim report of the state backward class commission.
The Supreme Court directed the Maharashtra Election Commission (SEC) to notify the election programme for the local bodies. A bench comprising justices AM Khanwilkar, AS Oka and JB Pardiwala observed that the election schedules for the local bodies are to proceed in terms of the delimitation that existed prior to March 11, 2022.
“We direct the state election commission and the authorities to ensure the election process commences in respect of each of those local bodies on the basis of the order. The state election commission is obliged to notify the election programme within two weeks from today,” said the court.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde termed the Supreme Court’s decision a big victory for his government. “We are happy that the OBC community will get political reservation in local body elections now,” Shinde said.
On the other hand, Opposition leader and former deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar said that the SC order was a result of the previous MVA government’s effort to appoint the commission.
“It is the victory of honest efforts made by the MVA government to safeguard OBC quota. We succeeded in this with the support of Uddhav Thackeray and other cabinet colleagues,” Pawar said.
Responding to Pawar’s comment, Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said that the elections to some local bodies were held without the OBC quota, and asked whether “the Opposition is ready to take credit for their missteps.”
Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray said in a statement that he was happy with the apex court’s decision.
He added that the previous MVA government headed by him had earnestly worked to get the OBC reservation.