OBC Reservations in Maharashtra Local Body Polls

Case Description

On 23 September 2021, the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government introduced 27 per cent reservations for Other Backwards Classes (OBCs) for local civic body elections through Ordinance 3 of 2021. The Ordinance was challenged by Rahul Ramesh Wagh, a social activist. 

Background

On 4 March 2021, a three-judge bench in Vikas Krishnarao Gawali v State of Maharashtra (2021) read down Section 12(2)(c) of The Maharashtra Zilla Parishad and Panchayat Samitis Act, 1961, which provided for OBC reservation in 27 per cent of the total number of seats. The provision was challenged as ultra vires for violating Articles 14, 16, 243-D and 243-T of the Constitution of India. The Court upheld its validity but interpreted the provision such that the 27 per cent reservation was restricted by the 50 per cent ceiling established in judicial precedent. The Court also underscored the need for collecting empirical data to determine metrics of “backwardness” of the OBC community in each municipal council. It reiterated the need for a triple test formality first prescribed by a Constitution Bench in K. Krishna Murthy (Dr.) v Union of India (2010): 

a. “To set up a dedicated Commission to conduct contemporaneous rigorous empirical enquiry into the nature and implications of the backwardness qua local bodies, within the State.

b. To specify the proportion of reservations required to be provisioned local body-wise in the light of recommendations of the Commission.

c. In any case, such reservations shall not exceed an aggregate of 50 per cent of the total seats reserved in favour of the SC/ST/OBCs taken together.”

As per the directions of the Supreme Court, the State Government constituted a commission on 29 June 2021. However, the State did not wait for the commission to complete its work before issuing the impugned Ordinance in September 2025. The Vikas Krishnarao Gawali v State of Maharashtra (2021) judgment became a valid precedent to challenge the subsequent Ordinance by the MVA government. 

On 6 December 2021, a Bench of Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and C.T. Ravikumar held that without strictly complying with the triple test formality, the State Election Commission cannot provide reservations for the OBC category in local civic bodies. It ordered a stay on local body elections in 367 OBC seats out of the total 2,100 seats until further orders across the State. 

Subsequently, on 15 December 2021, the Supreme Court flagged the need to re-reserve 27 per cent OBC seats for the General Category, holding that without complying to the triple test, OBC reservations are non est in law. Therefore, the Court ordered the State Election Commission to issue a fresh notification and conduct elections of the corresponding number of seats in the open category. 

The State Government, however, refused to conduct elections without OBC reservations, leading to en masse vacancies within local bodies. In March 2022, it set up a commission to empirically assess the nature and implications of “OBC backwardness” in each municipal council. The six-member commission was headed by Jayant Kumar Banthia and came to be known as the Banthia Commission. 

On 4 May 2025, the petition was heard by a three-judge Bench comprising Justices Khanwilkar, A.S. Oka, and Ravikumar. The Supreme Court sternly asked the State Government to explain the vacancy across 2486 seats in the local bodies across the State. Two months later, the Banthia Commission submitted its report on 7 July 2022, after conducting the necessary enquiries to recommend a 27 per cent reservation subject to the 50 per cent ceiling. The Bench directed the Election Commission to re-notify the election process in accordance with the recommendations. 

The matter was next heard in July 2022. The bench directed the State Election Commission not to renotify elections for all 367 local bodies, since elections to most had already commenced, but to notify elections for 96 of the 367 local bodies that had yet to be elected. Yet again, the State did not oblige, leading to a contempt petition. 

After a year-long vacuum, on 23 August 2024, a Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan dismissed the contempt petition for want of initiation and resumed hearing the matter. 

On 6 May 2025, the Court directed the State Election Commission to provide reservations to the OBC community as per the law before the 2022 Banthia Commission Report and notify elections within 4 weeks, aiming to conclude the same in four months. 

Subsequently, on 16 September 2025, the State directed the State Election Commission to complete all pending delimitation exercises by 31.10.2025and directed elections of local bodies to be conducted by 31.01.2026, failing which no further time shall be granted to the State Election Commission. 

The matter was last heard on 12 January 2026. The matter shall be next heard on 23 February 2026.