“Even AI (Artificial Intelligence) cannot answer this. We want elections to happen soon. We cannot deprive local bodies of its representatives. Hopefully, in the next couple of days, the Supreme Court’s order is expected,” Fadnavis said at Mumbai Tech Week.
The term of corporators expired in March 2022 and the elections are due since then. The BMC is among Asia’s richest civic bodies.
The top court’s order is awaited on the Other Backward Class (OBC) quota. In December 2021, the Supreme Court ]ruled that reservation for OBCs in local bodies would not be allowed unless the government fulfilled the triple test laid down in the apex court’s 2010 order. It had ruled that until the triple test criteria was fulfilled, OBC seats would be re-notified as general category seats.
The triple test required the state government to set up a dedicated commission to gather data on the backwardness of OBCs in every local body, to specify the proportion of reservation in each local body in light of the commission’s recommendations, and ensure that such reservation does not exceed the overall 50% quota ceiling.
The Fadnavis Cabinet has two deputy chief ministers – Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar. On the question of dealing with them, he said, “I am okay with everyone.”
He also spoke on how to stay mentally healthy. “We need to talk stress out with someone. My principle is to think ‘worst could have happened’.
Today people talk a lot about stress but its only if you take stress,” he said.
He mentioned that any job from peon to president, one has to deal with stress. “I am more mature than I was in 2014 because I can deal with stress,” he said.
He added he does not do yoga either.
