Mumbai: In a sign of growing popularity of Manoj Jarange Patil among the Maratha community, the quota activist will set to address his second rally in Pune. The rally will be held in Rajgurunagar in Pune on Friday, October 20, said the Maratha Kranti Morcha (MKM) officials.
According to the members of MKM, they have already initiated preparations for the forthcoming rally. Jarange Patil will visit the protesters in Rajgurunagar who have been on a strike with demand for reservation for the Maratha community and later address people in the same area.
The Pune rally will come after a huge public rally held on October 14 at Antarwali Sarati village in Jalna, where Jarange Patil gave a 10-day ultimatum to the state government to give reservation to the Maratha community.
Jarange Patil rose to prominence after he held a 17-day fast since August 29 in Antarwali Sarati village in Jalna district seeking quota benefits in education and jobs for Marathas under the Other Backward Classes (OBC) category. He withdrew his fast only after Chief Minister Eknath Shine met him and assured that the government is working out a solution to provide reservation for the community.
Following Jarange Patil’s hunger strike to press for the reservation demands, the state government had issued a Government Resolution on Maratha reservation, which stated that the government would provide Kunbi caste certificates to all Marathas from Marathwada who possess Nizam-era revenue records, educational records and other supporting records and if ‘Kunbi’ is mentioned in their genealogy. The state’s Kunbi community is associated with agriculture-related occupations and is grouped under the Other Backward Classes (OBC) category.
Jarange Patil, however, did not accept the GR and urged the government to relax the condition of furnishing genealogy documents.
After ending his fast, the quota activist on September 30 kick-started a 14-day state-wide tour, during which he visited 87 villages in 13 districts in the first phase to interact with the Maratha community. After completing the tour, he held a first public rally at Antarwali Sarati village in Jalna on October 14.
During the tour, Jarange Patil had said the aim of the tour was to explain the quota issue to the community members and had said in his speeches that he would not sit quiet till he secured reservation for the Maratha community.
