Mumbai: Maratha quota campaigner Manoj Jarange-Patil’s agitation operates like clockwork. Each time elections approach in Maharashtra, Jarange-Patil announces a statewide protest, reiterating his demand for reservation for the Maratha community under the Other Backward Classes (OBC) category in the state. With the municipal corporation elections, delayed for over two years across all districts, expected to be held in the coming months, Jarange-Patil has announced yet another agitation. This time, terming it his “final agitation,” Jarange-Patil has announced a sit-in hunger strike at Azad Maidan in Mumbai.He has declared that he will begin his march from Antarwali Sarathi in Jalna district on August 27 – coinciding with the start of Ganesh Chaturthi, an important festival in Maharashtra – and is expected to reach Mumbai on August 29.“We will set out from Antarwali Sarathi on August 27. This will be a peaceful rally, but we won’t budge until we get our reservation this time,” Jarange-Patil said during a public rally held in Beed on Sunday, August 24. “This will be a final agitation. I appeal to everybody to come forward and make it a grand success and show our strength. Chalo Mumbai,” he added.The demand for reservation for the Maratha community is an old one, and in the past decade, different political and community leaders have championed the cause. However, over the past two years, Jarange-Patil has emerged as a face of the Maratha community, organising similar agitations across different parts of the state. Each time, the community has rallied around him in large numbers.In the past, many of Jarange-Patil’s agitations have led to violence, with the police using force against the agitators. Several protesters have been arrested from time to time, and FIRs have been registered against them en masse.Jarange-Patil has repeatedly targeted the BJP government, and more specifically, chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, accusing him of scuttling every possibility of reservation for the community. He has also accused Fadnavis of giving the police a free hand to be violent toward the protesters. In 2024, Jarange-Patil accused Fadnavis of trying to “eliminate him”.Reservation for the Maratha community, which is considered socially and politically dominant in the state, has been contentious. Many critics have argued against the “social backwardness,” an important indicator for granting reservation to any community. The community has a significant political presence, and of the three main parties of the Mahayuti, two parties – the Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde) and the Nationalist Congress Party (Ajit Pawar) – are headed by Maratha leaders.Last week, the Mahayuti government decided to reconstitute a 12-member subcommittee with state minister and BJP leader Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil as its new head. Earlier, the committee was headed by another BJP leader Chandrakant Patil for close to three years. Patil will now be a member of the committee. With local body elections due later this year, the government knows a statewide agitation for a Maratha quota could potentially trigger unrest, especially if Jarange-Patil decides to bring his agitation to Mumbai during the 10-day-long Ganesh Chaturthi festival, when managing the law and order situation in the city is already a nightmare for the state police.Responding to Jarange-Patil’s call for agitation, Fadnavis claimed that the BJP-led Mahayuti government has always been “committed” to the Maratha cause. “The state government is committed to Maratha reservation. Our government has already given ten percent reservation to Marathas,” he said. To Jarange-Patil’s call for a fresh agitation, Fadnavis added, “In a democracy, everybody has the right to express their views. We are ready to listen to their demands and consider them wherever possible.”