The Maratha Kranti Morcha (MKM) on Sunday intensified its agitation by staging demonstrations across Marathwada, North Maharashtra, Western Maharashtra, Konkan and Vidarbha even as demand for the resignation of Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis gained momentum. In Mumbai, MKM workers held protest at Dadar. State transport bus services remained suspended in several places, including Solapur and Pune. The street agitation was the fallout of Saturday incident where police used baton and lobbed tear gas shells to disperse the crowd at Antarwali Sarathi in Jalna district. The clashes between police and protesters left more than 40 injured both sides. Police had gone to the site to shift Manoj Jarasange who was on an indefinite hunger strike to hospital. Jarasange said, “We were protesting peacefully and police also initially spoke well with us. But then there was a call and they started forcefully removing us, leading to the incident.” Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar and Shiv Sena (UBT) president Uddhav Thackeray visited Jalna to express solidarity with protesters, while Maharashtra Navnirman Sena led by Raj Thackeray extended support to the Maratha reservation agitation. The MNS chief held telephonic talks with Jarasange while a party delegation led by Bal Nandgaonkar met him. An MKM coordinator who did not wish to be named said, “The protesters want government to immediately issue a GR (government resolution) on Maratha reservation and implement the quota in government jobs and education. Police personnel who resorted to lathicharge should also be suspended and Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis who holds home portfolio should take responsibility and resign.” At Beed, a handful of Maratha activists waded through the knee-deep waters of the Godavari river, raising slogans, while in Nanded, they have given a bandh call for Monday. In Ahmednagar, the activists observed a bandh on Sunday. At Buldhana, the protesters stopped Minister Sanjay Rathod’s convoy and burnt truck tyres, while demonstrations were held in Solapur, Dhule, Sindhudurg, Nashik, Pune and Mumbai. In Baramati, pro-reservation activists put up posters of Shinde and Fadnavis with a cross, demanding their resignation, even as in Parli of Beed district, a group of activists declared indefinite protest till their demands are met. State BJP president Chandrashekhar Bawankule, who was shown black flags by protesters in Akola, said, “Everybody knows who is politicising the Maratha reservation. In 1994, when Gowari tribals held demonstrations at Nagpur they had requested the then CM (Sharad) Pawar to come and accept their memorandum. The venue between Gowari protest venue and Pawar’s official residence in Nagpur was barely 100 metres. Yet, he did not even show sensitivity to come and talk to tribals. Instead, there was police lathicharge that lead to stampede and deaths of hundreds of innocent poor adivasis.” According to Bawankule, Pawar neither resigned nor took the responsibility for the deaths of tribals then.
