Lawyers and activists take precautions that the government’s move cannot face judicial inquiry. Critics argue:

• A state government cannot unilaterally change the classification of caste unilaterally without the approval of the central OBC list.

• The use of gazetters is historically suspected and legally unstable as the basis of reconstruction.

• Any increase in the effective number of OBC beneficiaries can be read as the expansion of the back door of reservation, which the Supreme Court revived the already resolved questions.

In short, even if the committee issues a certificate, the legal battle is unavoidable.

For now, Manoj Gerange has closed his fast, and the government has bought temporary peace. But the big war is only the beginning:

• OBC workers like HAKE are gathering, vowing to not allow their quota to erase.

• Legal challenges are almost certain, potentially pulling the issue back into courts.

• Politically, both the ruling coalition and the opposition face the same dilemma: how to satisfy the Marathas without the opposition of the OBC, whose number and effects are equally malicious.

The Maratha Kota stir has once again highlighted Maharashtra’s most combustible defects: competitive demands of major and backward castes in a state where reservation is a tool for social justice and a weapon for political existence. The ‘solution’ of the government can calm the roads for now, but in courts and villages, the fight is only the beginning.

With PTI input

According to an FIR registered at Civil Lines Police Station here on 1 September, Pathanmajra was booked on charges of rape, cheating and criminal intimidation.

The case was registered on the basis of a complaint by the woman in Zirakpur, who alleged that the MLA misrepresented himself, entered a relationship with her, and later married in 2021, while already getting married.

He accused her of sexually abusing, threatening and sending him “porn” materials.

After the FIR was filed, Pathanmajra went live on Facebook on Tuesday, strongly criticized the Punjab government and alleged that the Delhi -based AAP leadership was “illegally rule over Punjab”.

He appealed to fellow party MLAs to stand with him, claiming that during the Congress or BJP governments, the central leadership did not interfere in the state affairs, the way AAP was doing.

On Sunday, Pathanmajra also accused a senior IAS officer that he failed to take action on his repeated requests for rivers, especially Tangri river dysing and clean-up.

However, AAP leader Baltage Singh Pannu said on Tuesday that Pathanmajra started raising the flood issue and after knowing the IAS officer that the police could take action against the woman on the basis of the woman’s complaint.