Here’s why Marathas protest for reservation time and again
they filled 63% of the unreserved gram pradhan positions.
Deshpande’s paper shows that Marathas have a greater probability of having a panchayat member who is close to or from their own households than all other caste groups.
These statistics mean that there would be no dearth of persons to undertake grass root mobilisation to run community based agitation.
While Marathas have historically dominated politics at higher levels in the state, their clout might have weakened under the present Bharatiya Janata Part government, which has a Brahmin chief minister. It will be naive to believe that opposition parties do not stand to gain from a Maratha polarisation against the BJP, which is already staring at the possibility of having to fight the elections without an alliance with the Shiv Sena.
Another important, although in no way unique, factor which might be fuelling repeated protests by Marathas around the reservation issue is the larger scheme of how these take place in India.
Pradeep Chhibber and others from University of California, Berkely had described it appropriately in June 2018 in these words: “The Indian state, no matter which party is in power, presents itself as mai-baap to its citizens. It, however, does not have the resources at its command to meet the demands raised by multiple and often competing groups. When these demands are not satisfied on favourable terms, it often takes organised action in the form of protests (and sometimes violence), for the state to respond. Over time this process has become ritualised into three distinct phases. A group’s demands are not heard or met. The group organises to protest, often violently. The state responds favourably.”
It needs to be remembered that the Marathas had actually successfully pressurised the state into granting them reservations before it was overturned by the judiciary.