Marathwada simmers as Manoj Jarange-Patil, Laxman Hake engage in war of words

Mumbai: As the politics over the reservation issue deepened, Maratha reservation campaigner Manoj Jarange-Patil and OBC resistance leader Laxman Hake engaged in a war-of-words on Sunday even as incident of minor clashes among the two communities were reported. 

The parallel protests have come as a major challenge for the Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis-Ajit Pawar government ahead of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly polls. 

Jarange-Patil, the founder of Shivba Sanghatana, is on a hunger strike while demanding issuance of a GR declaring Marathas as Kunbis, issuance of Kunbi-Maratha and Maratha-Kunbi certificates and implement the draft notification on ‘sage-soyare’, a Marathi term for ‘relatives from the family tree', which widens  the scope of the quota.

Prof Hake and Navnath Waghmare have launched a counter-hunger strike to safeguard the OBC quota and scrap the draft ‘sage-soyare’ notification.

Both the groups are on sit-in at the Ambad taluka in Jalna district of Marathwada region of Maharashtra.

While Jarange-Patil is holding agitation in Antarwali-Sarathi, Prof Hake is undertaking a protest at Wadigodri. 

Jarange-Patil once again targetted state’s Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Protection Minister Chhagan Bhujbal, a veteran OBC leader and All India Mahatma Phule Samata Parishad. “Hake is from the natak company of Bhujbal,” said Jarange-Patil. 

“Is Jarange-Patil from the tamasha group of Shinde,” said Prof Hake.  “hinde is responsible for creating the tense atmosphere. Maharashtra is not the personal property of either Jarange or Shinde,” he said.