Contemporary Indian politics is replete with social activists used as pawns by political bigwigs to reap electoral harvests in election seasons. Anna Hazare’s demand for Lokpal to Rakesh Tikait’s farmers’ protest and Jaat Aandolan in Haryana- the list is long.
A common thread runs through these protests- which to common people may appear organic. All these agitations were meticulously handled by proxies to replenish their waning political influence. The ‘handlers’, who had lost credibility among the people hid behind these dummies to create unrest and schism in the society for a few more votes.
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Kejriwal used Hazare’s anti-corruption crusader image to launch is political career. Tikait remained a pawn in the hands of Jat leadership in West UP while Hooda’s of Haryana milked Jat agitation to rebuild their flagging political careers.In this context, the demand for the Maratha reservation led by Manoj Patil-Jarange begs closer scrutiny.
The genesis of renewed Maratha reservation agitation can be traced to Maha Vikas Aghadi MVA’s ascension to power in Maharashtra by unseating Uddhav Thackrey as the state Chief Minister. The MVA under Eknath Shinde further consolidated its position by splitting the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and bringing Ajit Pawar to the NDA fold.
Out of power and facing depletion in rank and file, Sharad Pawar, the great Maratha, responded with the elan of a battle-hardened general. Enter Jarange-Patil, the quintessential, self-effacing social activist with no political baggage that would drag him down while leading the agitation.
The rise of the Maratha-quota leader is reminiscent of the slow, yet steady growth of small farmer leaders in Marathwada and Western Maharashtra two decades back. While some like Sharad Joshi (though he later entered the RS with Shiv Sena’s help) remained apolitical, others like Raju Shetty’s Shetkari Sangathan entered the electoral fray to mobilize farming communities. The net loser was Sharad Pawar.
Two decades later, the Maratha strongman seems to have borrowed this tactic from the BJP-Sena playbook to lay a trap for his political rivals.
After testing water in 2024/ elections, the Pawar-Patil duo have sought to trigger yet another disruption.
The ruling party’s predicament on the issue is palpable- both legally and politically. 10 percent reservation over and above the 50 percent cap imposed by the Supreme Court would be untenable. Even as the state government seeks to find a solution to the vexing issue, Patil upped the ante and opened up a Pandora’s box seeking reservations for Maratha under the OBC category.
That’s vintage Sharad Pawar at work. In all these years, the ‘Maratha strongman’ has not taken a clear and categorial line on Maratha reservations. The ambiguity is probably aimed at having the cake and eating it too.
Contrary to his claims of making equidistance from all politicians, Jarange Patil never attacks Pawar senior directly even as he singles out former CM and BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis for the choicest of allegations. The ‘invisible hand’ behind Patil’s protracted agitation has been the worst-kept secret in Maharashtra politics. So much so that Mr Pawar has had to come out and issue statements refuting allegations of being the man behind Patil’s agitation.
If one were to go back a few decades in state politics, the Maratha reservation could have been implemented by Sharad Pawar along with the Mandal Commission Report. Who else could have done it better than the four-times CM of the state? Nor did the Uddhav Thackeray take any concrete steps to resolve the issue during its 2.5-year tenure.
It was Devendra Fadnavis who made the most serious attempt to find an amicable solution to the Maratha reservations conundrum in 2018 when he was the CM of the state. And he tried to do that without tinkering with the existing reservations for the OBCs for that would have disrupted the social balance and harmony.
It is precisely for this reason that an attempt to seek Maratha reservations under the OBC category is being demanded. The aim is to deepen the existing faultlines ahead of the next round of assembly polls.
The BJP has to walk on a razor’s edge as social rift cost them dear in the 2024 LS polls. NDA’s came down to 17 seats from 41 in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Tall OBC leaders like Pankaja Munde, daughter of an OBC leader Late Gopinath Munde, lost from BJP’s pocket borough in Beed.
As elections approach, Jarange Patil has threatened to intensify his protests if his demands are not met. But his former associates have now started to question his intent.
Even as passions rise on either side of the divide, the real ‘handlers’ of the self-styled social activists have already started to count their votes.
