Bombay HC seeks state govt's crystal clear' stand on Maratha quota PILs
Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Tuesday asked the state to clarify its “crystal clear stand” on whether public interest litigations (PILs) on Maratha reservation should be sent to the state’s Commission for Backward Classes or not.
A petition filed by Balasaheb Sarate and Ajay Baraskar said that the state in December 2016 had appointed retired high court Justice Sambhaji Mhase as chairman of Maharashtra State Commission for Backward Classes. The petition said therefore, the issue of Maratha reservation should be sent to the commission first.
The high court was also agreed with the intervener and asked state to file its reply.
In its reply, state merely said it does not have any objection if the matter is sent to the Commission for Backward Classes, but did not clarify whether the matter should be sent to the Commission or not.
While hearing the matter on Tuesday, the court said, “State must clear its stand. State just can’t stand at one side and look what is happening in the matter, it should clear its stand.” A division bench of Chief Justice Manjulla Chellur and Justice Girish Kulkarni was hearing the petition.
During a hearing in January, the court had said, “It will be better, if the commission looks at all the minute details of the data and information collected by state government.”
The court further said, “We hear thousands of matters and it is not possible for us to look into all the minute details of the data. If the Commission hears the matter first and then it comes to us then it would be better for us. So Commission is the better option.”
Senior counsel V.A. Thorat, who had appeared for the Maharashtra government as a special public prosecutor, had told the Bombay high court in February that if court passes an order that the Maratha reservation issue should be heard by the commission, the state would respect it and go to the commission. On this, the high court said, “State is free to go to commission, we never asked you to constitute a commission”.
