Ajit Pawar and Manoj Jarange (R)
Credit: PTI Photos
Mumbai: Quota politics dominated the political landscape of Maharashtra in 2023 with social tensions simmering for most part of the year.
Activist Manoj Jarange spearheaded the Maratha quota agitation, but it also led to OBC leaders to assert that the existing OBC reservation must not be affected while giving quota to the Marathas.
The quota agitation saw a sudden revival when police used lathi-charge against the protesters at the venue of Jarange’s hunger strike at his village in Latur district on September 1.
The agitation intensified, forcing the government to enter into negotiations with him. Chief Minister Eknath Shinde assured in December that a special session of the legislature will be held to grant quota to the Marathas, if needed.
If 2022 saw Eknath Shinde splitting the Shiv Sena and forming a government in alliance with the BJP, in 2023 it was Ajit Pawar who did Eknath Shinde on his uncle Sharad Pawar.
Ajit Pawar and several NCP leaders joined the Shiv Sena-BJP government in July 2023 with Ajit becoming a second deputy chief minister in addition to the BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis.
The fluid situation set the stage for the Lok Sabha elections and the assembly elections that will follow.
Maharashtra accounts for 48 Lok Sabha seats, the second highest in the country after Uttar Pradesh.
Before coming out in public against his uncle, Ajit Pawar gave a letter to the Election Commission stating that he was the Nationalist Congress Party president (and not Sharad Pawar).
This triggered a legal dispute as to which faction is the `real' NCP and the Election Commission is seized of the issue.
Earlier in February, in a blow to the Uddhav Thackeray group, the EC awarded the Shiv Sena name and symbol to Shinde’s faction.
In May, the Supreme Court in its order on disqualification petitions filed by the warring Sena factions held that then governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari's decision to ask chief minister Uddhav Thackeray to prove his majority in the assembly following Shinde’s rebellion was not justified, but the Thackeray government could not be restored now because he chose to resign instead of facing a trust vote.
The constitution bench asked speaker Rahul Narwekar to decide the disqualification petitions against 16 Sena MLAs including Shinde expeditiously. In December, the court extended the deadline for giving decision to January 10, 2024.
The Supreme Court has agreed to take up a curative petition of the state government challenging the court's earlier decision to strike down the Maratha quota on January 24, while Jarange has announced a hunger strike in Mumbai from January 20.
Jarange has been demanding that all Marathas be given Kunbi caste certificates. Kunbis, an agrarian community, are already in the OBC list.
OBC leaders including NCP veteran and state minister Chhagan Bhujbal have said they would not brook the Marathas getting a share in the OBC quota.
The elections in 2024 will be an acid test for all major political leaders in the state: Uddhav Thackeray, Sharad Pawar, Eknath Shinde, Ajit Pawar and Devendra Fadnavis.
Senior Congress leader Ratnakar Mahajan said 2023 was ending on a confusing note, and the elections might lead to more political fragmentation and greater confusion.
Senior journalist Prakash Akolkar said caste tensions are being created purposely by vested political interests and it will have repercussions in the elections.
BJP leader Madhav Bhandari, on the other hand, said the caste conflict was a superficial phenomenon and would not affect the elections in 2024.
The recently held Gram Panchayat elections – where the ruling alliance claimed to have done well though these elections are not contested on party lines – proved as much, he said.