Alleged OBC leader Gopichand Padalkar
@the_news_21
Mumbai: OBC leader Gopichand Padalkar has slammed State Government over the issue of OBC reservation. Padalkar has expressed his displeasure over the inaction of the Maharashtra government regarding the OBC reservation issue.
“The state government has deliberately not taken any step forward regarding the issue of OBC reservation in local body elections. It is nothing but suppressing the voice of OBCs,” alleged Padalkar.
“In the last 105 local body elections at least four OBC corporators used to get elected per Zilla Parishad but now you can calculate how many OBCs will get representations. As these elections will be held without the OBC quota. This is a very dangerous situation for the future if OBCs don’t get any representation,” said Padalakar.
OBC reservations for local body polls in Maharashtra still haven’t received the apex court’s nod since they did not comply with the triple test. In March last year, the Supreme Court had laid down the triple test or conditions that state governments need to satisfy before they can notify quotas for OBCs in local body elections. The judgment came on petitions challenging provisions of the Maharashtra Zilla Parishads and Panchayat Samitis Act, 1961 that allowed the state government to reserve 27 per cent of seats for OBCs in the Zilla Parishads and Panchayat Samitis concerned.
While the court upheld this provision, it read it down to mean that it can be invoked only when the triple conditions are satisfied before seats reserved for the OBC category are notified for the local bodies. As for Maharashtra, the state government had constituted a Backward Classes Commission in June last year.
However, without waiting for its report, the state issued an ordinance amending provisions in two legislations — the Maharashtra Village Panchayats Act and the Maharashtra Zilla Parishads and Panchayat Samitis Act. These amendments permitted a 27 per cent quota for OBCs in local bodies.
This quota was challenged in the Supreme Court again, which, on 6 December last year, stayed the elections to the 27 per cent OBC category seats in Maharashtra local bodies. In doing so, the court asserted that the state government had not followed the triple test laid down by it.
