With the Maratha quota, PTAs say, the state has exceeded the 50% cap set by the SC
A day after the Bombay High Court upheld the quota for Marathas under the Socially and Educationally Backward Class, medical students from the open category said on Friday that they would challenge the ruling in the Supreme Court.
Parents Teachers Associations representing the open category students from undergraduate and postgraduate medical and dental courses are opposed to the 12% reservation in education and 13% in jobs for the Maratha community on the grounds that it exceeds the 50% cap on quotas set by the apex court.
Maharashtra's quota level now comprises 52% for OBCs, SCs, STs, denotified nomadic tribes and special backward categories, 13% for Marathas and 10% for economically weaker section (if granted by the Centre). This leaves the open category with just a quarter of the pie.
THE CHALLENGE
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- With the Maratha quota, PTAs say, the state has exceeded the 50% cap set by the SC
- Also, they don’t want the quota to be applied for the current batch of UGs in medical/dental courses
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Sudha Shenoy, who represents a PTA, called the HC decision an injustice on the open category students, especially from the PG and UG medical and dental courses. "Their seats have been reduced due to the reservation granted to the SEBCs and EBCs in the state.''
Meanwhile, the Maharashtra government and Maratha Kranti Morcha coordinator Vinod Patil separately filed caveats in the
SC with a request to give them a chance to argue their case before giving an ex parte order on any petition against the Bombay High Court order.
Apart from their quota challenge, the PTAs will also file another petition in SC seeking that the new quota not be considered for admissions into UG medical and dental courses for this year.
They contend that the admission process had begun in November 2018, well before the state awarded quota to the Socially and Educationally Backward Class.
While upholding the Maratha quota, the HC asked the state to bring down the percentage for education to 12 from 16. With this 4% reduction, nearly 80 seats from public and private colleges will now be available to the open category students for postgraduate medical and dental courses. Similarly, an additional 229 medical and dental seats will be freed for the open category undergraduate students.
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