‘Maratha report is based on terms that justify quota’

MUMBAI: The recommendations of the Maharashtra State Backward Classes Commission (MSBCC) were based on parameters that could justify the Maratha reservation, and three of the five organisations that conducted the survey were linked to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), one of which has CM Devendra Fadnavis as its member, Pradip Sancheti, the counsel for petitioner Sanjeet Shukla, alleged in the Bombay high court (HC) on Wednesday. While Sancheti’s arguments will continue on Thursday, the state’s arguments will begin from February 26

Sancheti told the division bench of justices Ranjit More and Bharti Dangre that the sample survey of 43,000 people, included only those persons from the community who came within the ambit of the parameters to prove the social, economic and educational backwardness of the community, making the surveys were also questionable. He said the commission’s conclusions were derived without referring to the state averages.

As an example, he said, the commission’s report claimed that 85% Marathas were involved in agricultural physical labour, while the state average was only 32%. He submitted that applying the state average would reveal that nearly 50% of the physical labour was being done by land owning Maratha farmers, which means they were land owners and not physical labourers.

He also referred to the data

pertaining to educational backwardness and said that while the report said that enrolment in schools among Maratha children was shown to be 83%, the state average pegged enrolment at 99.3%.

He said while there was an existing system that had been followed by previous commissions, the current MSBCC adopted a new method of marking which was not required. The parameters went over and above the state average, which proved the methodology was faulty. Meanwhile, former member of parliament and sitting member of the Maharashtra legislative council Haribhau Rathod has filed a petition in the Bombay high court seeking permission to intervene in the ongoing case. Rathod claimed the MSBCC report was one-sided and has referred to selective parts of judgements by the apex court to justify its recommendations for reservation.