Maratha protest shows Maharashtra is no better than casteist Bihar or Uttar Pradesh

File photo of protesters in Maharashtra | Manisha Mondal/ThePrint

Rising unemployment and deepening agricultural crisis have fuelled the Maratha anger, which is threatening Fadnavis in run up to the elections.

Maharashtra has always prided itself as a progressive, liberal and modern state with a rich legacy of social reforms, anti-caste campaigns and robust industrialisation.

But now, the spectre of anarchy looms over it due to the Maratha agitation, and neither “Maratha strongman” Sharad Pawar nor election-anxious- Brahmin CM Devendra Fadnavis has any control over the situation.

I remember my days as a budding reporter in the early ‘70s when most IAS officers from other states would openly say that they opted for Maharashtra because it was free from caste and other discriminations.

The ‘60s had witnessed caste riots across the country.

Mantralay, the official headquarters of the government, would have nameplates like Subramaniam, Srinivasan, Ranganathan, and so on. That was because the Tamil Brahmins, they used to say, were hounded out of the state by the Dravidian Movement. There were also Mishras, Jhas, Tiwaris and Shuklas. They too would complain about casteism in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. There were also Sikhs and Hindu Punjabis in Maharashtra then.

Brahmins but anti-RSS

Those were the days when Maharashtra was under the spell of Y.B. Chavan’s leadership, even after he had shifted to Delhi, first as part of Pandit Nehru’s cabinet and later under Indira Gandhi. He was a devotee of what is today known as Nehruvism.

After Chavan, other ‘Maratha’ leaders like Sharad Pawar, Vilasrao Deshmukh, Prithviraj Chavan took centre stage but kept the modernist-progressive legacy of Maharashtra alive.

The state’s degeneration into vicious caste rivalries, and lately Hindu fundamentalism, was slow but steady. The RSS had no social base, except among some tiny Brahmin communities.

The socio-political reality of that time was such that most progressive movements were led by Brahmins. Leftists like comrade Shripad Amrit Dange, S.M. Joshi and Madhu Limaye were Brahmins and yet diehard anti-RSS. So were the Brahmin leaders in the Congress, such as Vitthalrao Gadgil, Vasant Sathe and R.K. Khadilkar.

The caste matrix

The point is: although the RSS was perceived as the organisation of the ‘Hindu Rashtra’, it had a distinct Brahmin face. Maharashtra, however, has less than four per cent Brahmins. Nearly 36 per cent are Kunbi/Marathas, over 10 per cent are Dalits, over 30 per cent are OBC and EBCs, and nearly 20 per cent adivasis. (These are broad percentages, not exact ones).

The Marathas who have begun their “uprising” of sorts are about 40 million or 4 crore, a number that is almost equal to the population of California.

The OBCs and EBCs are divided into several smaller castes and are not a dominant force, although Malis (Bagwans) and Dhangars are the largest among them. NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal is a Mali and Mahadev Jankar, who is cabinet minister in the current Maharashtra government, is a Dhangar. Ramdas Athawale, a Dalit from the Mahar community, is a minister in the union cabinet.

Till the late ‘80s, Marathas, Dalits, OBCs and even adivasis were socially and politically hostile to the RSS. Even the urban educated Brahmins often used the pejorative term “chaddiwalas” for the RSS. The Marathas, particularly in the rural areas, considered the RSS politically irrelevant. But, political caste equations began to change in the ‘90s.

Shiv Sena-BJP alliance

The first change in the caste equation came with the Rath Yatra led by Lal Krishna Advani in 1990. The Hindu identity began to influence a section of the Marathas and the OBCs. With the demolition of the Babri Majid in 1992, followed by riots, the Hindu politics was reinforced.

Indeed, the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance could not have come to power in 1995 if the backdrop of Babri was not there. Balasaheb Thackeray’s strident (some would say rowdy) Hindutva integrated itself with the Advani-led “Mandir Wahin Banayenge” movement. The two became compatible partners.

And yet, their social base was different. The Shiv Sena was born on the streets of Mumbai, among the unemployed Marathi youth and their emerging leaders. They roamed the streets like local “dadas”, who were sometimes benevolent and sometimes belligerent. They could handle community problems, bypassing municipal bureaucracy and even “solve” conflicts without resorting to police or judiciary. The Sangh Parivar epitomised the white-collar middle class, which used to look down upon the Shiv Sena as thugs!

The Shiv Sena had no specific caste-community base. They could get the support of the OBCs and Marathas alienated by the Congress. Balasaheb also enjoyed a following among the upper castes (Brahmins, Saraswats, and so on).

The Congress could never have made a Brahmin the chief minister of Maharashtra. It prided itself as a “Bahujan Samaj Party”, which in real terms meant representing the 36 per cent Marathas. It was Balasaheb who, in 1995, anointed Manohar Joshi as the state’s first Brahmin chief minister since it was carved out of the Bombay state.

Understanding Maratha anger

Although apparently homogeneous, the Marathas have a sharp internal hierarchy to the extent of not even allowing intermarriages within sub-groups.

Then there are those who control the levers of economic, social and political power. Almost all sugar factories, most educational institutions, the local “Kharedi-Vikri Sangh”, and most cooperative banks are controlled by the ruling Maratha class.

Over the years, the lower rungs of the Marathas who were not part of the ruling hierarchy were alienated. The rising unemployment among the Marathas, deepening agricultural crisis and declining career opportunities among the educated have fuelled frustration. Their grouse was mainly against the “Maratha ruling clique”. That anger was simmering.

To add to the growing resentment, Kunbis, the associate caste of the Marathas, were given reservation. Marathas were ruled out for reservation because they were identified as “forward” caste under the Mandal system. Kunbis too have now joined the “uprising” because being recognised as Maratha gives them a stake in the ruling establishment.

According to an elaborate research paper by the Gokhale Institute of Politics & Economics, maximum farmer suicides in Maharashtra are committed by the Maratha peasantry. The distress in the agricultural sector has taken dangerous proportions. The BJP or even the RSS never had any roots in the agricultural community, although they could superimpose the Hindutva frenzy in the rural Maharashtra.

The fabric woven by the Congress during the freedom movement and later by Y.B. Chavan is being torn apart. There is no leader for the Maratha agitation, and nor does it have any representative political party. The only binding force is caste.

The inclusive Maharashtra of the ‘60s-‘70s is lost. Today, Maharashtra is as casteist as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, or perhaps more. And, the Maratha agitation threatens to push Maharashtra into a deep state of chaos.

Kumar Ketkar is a former editor and Congress member of Rajya Sabha.