Maratha-Kunbi reservation: Govt may find itself in tight spot

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar: The State government may find itself in a tight corner as concrete entries related to the Maratha-Kunbi reservation was not found in the records so far.

It may be noted that a group of Maratha community members staged an indefinite hunger strike at Antarwali Sarati in Jalana district for 17 days seeking reservation for the Maratha community as Kunbi in the OBC category.

The State Government set up a chief committee to examine old records of the region to find out documents in support of the reservation. The Government may find itself in a tight spot as no concrete evidence has been found so far in the records. The main committee will hold its meeting in Mumbai on

September 30.

Divisional commissioner Madhukarraje Ardad is member secretary of the panel which has 20 members. All the records of revenue departments of the region were examined but, the required entries were not found in the records yet. The task of examining the records will be completed in the coming eight days. The region has a Maratha population of around 1 crore.

There are 80 lakh documents in the records. The committee examined 75 per cent of records to date while only 5,000 old documents mentioning the Maratha community as Kunbi was found.

A research team visited Hyderabad recently and found 1200 documents which do not have details like Kunbi and Maratha as one community.

Meanwhile, divisional commissioner Ardard will seek information from the collectors of all the districts of Marathwada through video conference on September 27 for updates in the records.

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Cell established at divisional commissioner

A cell was established at the office of the divisional commissioner to examine records and collect proof for the reservation. Additional collector of Dharashiv Shivaji Shinde was entrusted with the responsibility of monitoring the cell which has tehsildar Shrikant Bhujbal, Bende and other two Avval Karkuns. The cell collects all information and sends it to the chief committee in the prescribed format. The data will have details like a number of examined records, and documents with the entries of Kunbi.

Head of the Data Collection Committee and additional collector Shinde said that the work of examining records would be completed in eight days.

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Records of 12 departments being examined

No entry about the Maratha-Kunbi reservation was found in the records of the Revenu Department. So, admission registers of the educational institutions were checked. Not much was found in the registers.

Now, entries in 12 departments are being examined. They included jail prisoners entries made before 1967, police records, licences issued by the State Excise Department, land deals entries in the registration and stamps department.

The district-wise cells were established in the region. Each Cell comprises a resident deputy collector, deputy superintendent of police, officer of Panchayat Samiti, education officer, deputy superintendent of police (Home) and District Jail superintendent.