Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange-Patil reached Mumbai on Friday morning to lead a rally at Azad Maidan, pressing for reservation for the Maratha community. The Mumbai Police had granted permission for the protest on Wednesday, allowing it to be conducted between 9 am and 6 pm with a maximum gathering of 5,000 participants. However, Jarange-Patil has announced that he will sit on an indefinite hunger strike at Azad Maidan until the government meets his demands. He arrived in Mumbai with a massive convoy of vehicles and nearly 40,000 supporters, as estimated by the police, reported Hindustan Times.
To ensure minimal disruption to daily traffic, Mumbai Police implemented strict traffic regulations and created a special green corridor for the convoy’s movement. The route was charted from Vashi toll plaza to Azad Maidan through the Eastern Freeway, which was closed for regular commuters from Thursday night. On Friday, his convoy passed through Vashi and proceeded via the Eastern Freeway as planned. When the rally reached Chembur, Sana Malik, an MLA from Ajit Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) faction, met Jarange-Patil and extended support to his movement, reported Hindustan Times.
Jarange-Patil and his followers had started their journey on Wednesday morning from Antarwali Sarathi village in Jalna district. This marks his ninth protest in two years, consistently demanding that Marathas be given reservation under the Other Backward Classes (OBC) category through the issuance of Kunbi certificates. The Maharashtra government’s cabinet sub-committee on Maratha reservation, led by senior BJP minister Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, is scheduled to meet him on Friday to discuss the matter further and consider possible solutions, reported Hindustan Times.
This is not the first time Jarange-Patil has mobilized such a march. In January last year, during his maiden rally to Mumbai, he had halted at Vashi after a request from the state government. At that time, he staged a hunger strike at Shivaji Chowk in Vashi, which was later withdrawn when then Chief Minister Eknath Shinde assured him that his demands would be met. Shinde had promised to issue Kunbi certificates to 57 lakh Marathas with ancestral or marital ties to Kunbis, granting them OBC reservation benefits, reported Hindustan Times.
Following this assurance, the state’s social justice department issued a draft notification to formalize the promise, but its implementation has remained pending. Ensuring that this notification is enforced is one of Jarange-Patil’s foremost demands. His movement gained major traction in September 2023, when he launched a hunger strike at Antarwali Sarathi village seeking OBC quota benefits for Marathas possessing Kunbi lineage. As the agitation spread, the government issued over eight lakh Kunbi certificates to Marathas, enabling several families to access OBC reservation benefits, reported Hindustan Times.