The Centre has moved the Supreme Court seeking review of the May 5 majority verdict which held that 102nd Constitution amendment took away the power of state governments to declare Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC) for grant of quota in jobs and admissions.
Top leaders of the two parties are campaigning in Jharkhand and Maharashtra for the ongoing assembly polls in the two states.
Eknath Shinde knows he can't possibly make all the MLAs loyal to him ministers. How will they be satisfied? And to satisfy them, the BJP will have to play ball.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Maharashtra State Election Commission (SEC) and all the state authorities to ensure that process for local bodies' election is "immediately commenced" in accordance with the recommendation made by the dedicated commission for reservation to Other Backward Classes (OBC).
Elections to 92 nagar parishads and four nagar panchayats in Maharashtra will be held on August 18, the State Election Commission (SEC) announced on Friday.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on Wednesday said the all-party meeting held earlier in the day decided that reservation should be given to the Maratha community without tampering with the existing quotas of other communities in the state.
'As soon as the BJP feels they are going to lose power, they will publish the caste census data of 2011 and conduct the caste census of 2021.'
The top court, which refused to pass any interim stay order on the quota, said chances of physical court seem remote due to the persisting COVID-19 pandemic. A bench of Justices L N Rao, Hemant Gupta and S Ravindra Bhatt asked the parties said that all parties should sit together and decide on modalities of hearing like who will take how much time and no one shall repeat the arguments.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed a plea filed by the Maharashtra government seeking a direction to the Centre and other authorities to disclose to the state the Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC) 2011 raw caste data of the Other Backward Classes.
Senior NCP leader and Maharashtra minister Chhagan Bhujbal on Wednesday said the Supreme Court order on the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) quota was a setback to the state government and it should do everything it can to save the community's reservation.
Khedkar, a 2023 batch Indian Administrative Service officer, was accused of misusing power and privileges during her training in Pune recently.
The Supreme Court Monday stayed till further orders the local body election in Maharashtra on 27 per cent seats reserved for the Other Backward Classes (OBC).
The Maharashtra government will bring an ordinance to grant OBC quota in upcoming by-elections to a set of local governing bodies without crossing the Supreme Court-mandated 50 per cent cap on reservation, said state minister Chhagan Bhujbal on Wednesday.
The Maharashtra government has moved the Supreme Court seeking recall of its order by which it had directed the State Election Commission (SEC) not to re-notify the poll process to 367 local bodies, where it has already commenced, in order to provide reservation to OBCs.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the State Election Commission of Maharashtra to notify 27 per cent seats in the local body, which were reserved for the Other Backward Classes, as general category so that the poll process can be taken forward.
A bench comprising justices A M Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheswari and C T Ravikumar was told by senior advocate Shekhar Naphade, who appeared in the matter on behalf of the state government, that a plea seeking a recall of the order was filed electronically on Monday.
The Maharashtra State Election Commission on Friday said polls to local bodies from other backward class reserved constituencies, which were scheduled on December 21, will now be held on January 18 and these seats will be converted as general category ones.
Maharashtra cabinet minister Chhagan Bhujbal has demanded a stay on the Kunbi caste certificates issued to Marathas following their latest agitation for reservation and scrapping of the Justice (retired) Sandeep Shinde committee formed over the quota issue.
The development comes after the Supreme Court decided to strike down the recent 27 percent reservation in favour of OBCs in local bodies made by Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh governments.
The principal opposition party though appeared content securing 99 of the 543 seats in the 2024 national elections as against its all-time low of 44 in 2014 and then 52 in 2019.
For how many generations would reservations in jobs and education continue, the Supreme Court sought to know during the Maratha quota case hearing on Friday and raised concerns over 'resultant inequality' in case the overall 50 per cent limit was to be removed.
Bhujbal took a veiled attack at Sharad Pawar for the opposition's boycott of an all-party meeting on the Maratha quota issue.
If Maratha activist Manoj Jarange Patil drops a hint of supporting or opposing a particular coalition on the eve of polling on November 20, things may change overnight.
The Supreme Court on Monday said it would hear on January 17 the matters in which it had directed the state election commissions of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh to re-notify the seats reserved for the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in the local bodies in these states under the general category.
Rejection of the three central agriculture laws is one of the three resolutions approved by the Maharashtra cabinet on Sunday which will be moved in the monsoon session of the state legislature beginning Monday, sources said.
All the essential services, schools and colleges have been excluded from the bandh.
Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange on Thursday ended his nine-day-old indefinite fast, but warned of a bigger agitation if no action was taken in two months on giving reservation benefits to the community.
The government also ruled out having a re-look at the present reservation system.
The 12 suspended members are -- Sanjay Kute, Ashish Shelar, Abhimanyu Pawar, Girish Mahajan, Atul Bhatkhalkar, Parag Alavani, Harish Pimpale, Yogesh Sagar, Jay Kumar Rawat, Narayan kuche, Ram Satpute and Bunty Bhangdia.
The Lok Sabha on Tuesday passed the Constitution amendment bill to restore the power of states to make their own OBC lists after a thaw in the logjam as Opposition parties backed the legislation but demanded the removal of the 50 per cent cap on reservation, with many of them also calling for a caste-based census.
A five-judge Constitution bench, headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan, gave a week time to all the states to submit their brief note of submissions after some of them sought time.
In a statement after the apex court verdict, Thackeray said, "With folded hands, we request the prime minister and the president to take an immediate decision on Maratha quota."
The Bombay High Court on Friday stayed implementation of the controversial decision of the erstwhile Congress-Nationalist Congress Party government in Maharashtra to provide reservation to Marathas in government jobs and educational institutions announced ahead of the state assembly election.
"That is a fact of life because we are not being able, after 75 years, to bring the SCs and STs to the same level of merit as the forward classes," Attorney General K K Venugopal told a bench headed by Justice L Nageswara Rao.
Shinde announced that his government is committed to providing reservation to the Maratha community.
'Arithmetic could decide the Haryana election given the presence of multi-cornered contests.'
The Supreme Court on Friday said that successful civil services aspirants have no right to be allocated a cadre of their choice or their home state, and also noted that before selection they opt to serve anywhere in the country "with eyes open" but later "scramble" for home cadre.
Pawar said, "I will meet PM Narendra Modi on July 18. During the meeting, I will take up various issues related to farmers with him. (NCP leader) Praful Patel and I will attend the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) meeting."
'We were supposed to be a united nation based on unity and diversity.' 'Now what we are doing is there will be a class called Marathas, Dangars, etc.' 'The 100 per cent of our nation's population will be in classes and you will be allocating the nation's education and service resources in terms of classes.' 'How does it work out in terms of equality? Where is your equal nation?'
Seen by political watchers as the favourite to retain power for a third straight term, the Bharatiya Janata Party has set itself an ambitious target of winning 370 Lok Sabha seats, a goal aimed as much at projecting its strength as at diminishing the opposition in popular imagination.
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