Mumbai: Violence erupted between police and agitators demanding reservation for Marathas in Jalna, Maharashtra Friday evening, with the police resorting to a lathi charge and the use of tear gas, and registering an FIR against 250 people the following day. The protesters had allegedly thrown stones at the personnel and torched at least two buses.
Even as Chief Minister Eknath Shinde has ordered an inquiry into the incident, the issue took a political turn with the Opposition slamming the government and condemning the lathi charge.
The clash was reported from Antarwali Sarathi in Ambad taluka near Beed in Jalna district around 6.30 pm Friday, when the police tried to stop an agitation led by a local Maratha leader, Manoj Jarange. Jarange has been on a hunger strike since last Monday, seeking reservation for Marathas in admissions to educational institutions and government jobs. Police said as many as 123 villages around Antarwali Sarathi supported the protest.
Jalna SP Tushar Doshi told ThePrint Saturday, “He was fasting until death in the true sense — he was not even gulping down the saliva. His health was deteriorating so our intention was to save him. We tried to talk to him but he was not budging.”
“When we went there on Friday to take him to the hospital, his supporters cornered us and started pelting stones,” he added. Amid the chaos, Jarange’s supporters took him away.
Police said that around 40 police personnel and dozens of civilians were injured. The FIR was registered under various sections of the Indian Penal Code including 307 (attempt to murder), 120(B) (criminal conspiracy) and 143 (unlawful assembly), as well as charges of rioting and damage to public property, according to police. The FIR has not been shared with the press.
Virendra Pawar, the coordinator of Maratha Morcha, the umbrella organisation coordinating the agitation, told reporters Saturday, “The Maratha community has been protesting peacefully over the years for their right to reservation. But the government resorted to a lathi charge and violence. The government will have to pay for this.”
Home minister Devendra Fadnavis told the media in Mumbai Friday that the government was in talks with the protesters and had urged them to end the hunger strike. He said that since the Maratha reservation issue was in the Supreme Court, it cannot be resolved in one day.
“But it is the responsibility of the administration to admit a person on hunger strike if their health is deteriorating. And accordingly, the administration went to have talks with them. But unfortunately, the mob of protesters turned violent and started throwing stones at police,” he said.
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Opposition reacts
Calling it a disturbing incident, Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar posted on X late Friday, “There is only dictatorship in the state. The home department is responsible for what happened in Jalna and I condemn this strongly.”
Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aaditya Thackeray posted on X that it was “heartbreaking” to see women and men of all ages subjected to a lathi charge, and demanded the chief minister’s resignation.
“The hostile takeover, the incompetent governance and absolute intolerance for anybody else asking for their rights only raises questions about democracy in Maharashtra and India at large. If they had any shame or sense of responsibility, the illegal CM and his cabinet would have stepped down,” he wrote Friday.
Congress leader Nana Patole demanded that the 50 percent cap on reservation be removed. “We condemn the lathi charge on Maratha protestors who were demanding reservation. The BJP doesn’t want to give reservation to Marathas. We demand that the reservation cap of 50 percent should be removed,” he said in a press statement.
(Edited by Smriti Sinha)
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