Mumbai: With the Maratha quotas starting to boil again, the Maharashtra Congress on Saturday reiterated its demand for giving reservations to Muslims and Dhangars as well as immediately conducting a nation-wide caste census.
State Congress Working President M. Arif Naseem Khan said that the quota demands of the Marathas, Muslims and Dhangars has been languishing for many years and the MahaYuti government in the state has done nothing about it.
“A new NDA government is taking office in the country tomorrow under the leadership of Prime Minister-elect Narendra Modi. Its ally Telugu Desam Party (TDP) has declared that it is committed to giving reservations to the Muslims in his state. If the TDP can give quotas to Muslims in Andhra Pradesh then why can’t Maharashtra follow suit and concede the same demands here?” questioned Khan.
Simultaneously, he said that the Centre should also amend the reservation laws on priority to ensure that not only the Marathas but also Muslims and Dhangars plus other groups are entitled to quotas as per their ‘backwardness’.
Supporting Shivba Sanghatana chief Manoj Jarange-Patil’s fifth hunger strike which started in Jalna today (June 8), Khan said that his demand for Maratha quotas is genuine, and the same should be applied to Muslims and Dhangars.
“Since there is a Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Centre, and it’s a constituent in Maharashtra, there should be no problems to provide reservations to the three communities. The former Congress government in the state had already given the quotas to Marathas and Muslims in 2014,” he said.
Khan added that Congress MP Rahul Gandhi has already made it clear that the 50 per cent ceiling on quotas must be scrapped, and a Caste Census should be carried out to decide on reservation for Marathas, Muslims, Dhangars and any other eligible communities determined by their social-economic ‘backwardness’ across the country.
(IANS)
