The shocking truth that the OBCs have not been given 27% of reservations in the upcoming panchayat elections was revealed in the Assembly. The government had to also admit that reservations have been based on statistics from 2013 after opposition MLAs collectively put pressure on the ruling party. The equally shocking information that came out in the open is that the government only used data available from the Directorate of panchayats and the Directorate of Social Welfare, which proves how negligent the government has been.
It’s only right that the petition has been filed in court against this faulty reservation. Most of the OBC leaders are involved in panchayat-level politics and have the strong backing of the public. If this public comes out on to streets, there will be a huge law and order issue for the government.
However, this particular section of society is pretty disconnected. They are not entirely aware of their rights. There is bliss in ignorance and OBC leaders have not learned anything from what was happening in the neighbouring state. If the OBC community was advanced, strong, and alert then there would have been political tremors not only in the State but across the country.
Some OBC leaders were upset after elections were announced without reservations for OBC. When reservations were announced and leaders realised that they have been deceived, it was too late to understand what exactly the government has been up to. The OBCs lost the reservations entirely after the Supreme Court took a stance that if there is no triple test, there will be no reservations for OBC. Now, the government and opposition are playing blame games.
If the Central government had provided states with the information regarding the Socio-Economic and Caste Census on time, then this chaos would have been avoided. The survey was conducted from 2011 to 2014 and it’s uncertain when it will be done next. The crucial question here is how and when the faults in the reservation system will be rectified.
Gandhi, Nehru and Ambedkar were of the opinion that democracy will not be strengthened without the involvement of women representatives and people belonging to the working class. The 73rd and 74th Amendment of the Constitution was done based on that very opinion with the efforts of Rajiv Gandhi and Narasimha Rao.
The reservations for women and OBC at the panchayat level began in 1994. The 5-member constitution bench presided by K Balakrishnan had considered 27% reservations for OBCs as valid but had ordered to complete the ‘triple-test’ procedure during execution.
This judgment from 2010 demanded to collect data regarding census, backwardness and representation of OBC class, the same empirical data that is the talk of the town at the moment. The Mahatma Phule Samata Parishad had to file a petition in the Supreme Court back in 2010 asking the Apex law body to give order to the Central government to collect this data.
The Nashik MP at that time Sameer Bhujbal had presented the motion in Lok Sabha regarding OBC Census, which was backed by the then BJP deputy leader in Lok Sabha Gopinath Munde along with 100 other MPs. Hence, the Manmohan Singh government undertook the work of this census on October 2, 2011.
The Census such as this one was being carried out for the first time since the country gained independence and it took four long years to complete. The data from this Census is a national treasure and the Central government cannot hold it back as that would be unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court had given its judgment in Vikas Kishanrao Gawali vs The State of Maharashtra that no empirical data is equivalent to no reservation. Neither OBC leaders nor the government learned from that judgment
The State government was aware of when to conduct panchayat polls for five years. They were aware of what steps to take regarding reservations one-and-a-half years back and yet, their laxity has been on full display.
