After a few months of waiting with fear and baited breath, people of Mumbai will finally have to face the biggest silent rally in the form of Maratha Morcha on Wednesday.

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After a few months of waiting with fear and baited breath, people of Mumbai will finally have to face the biggest silent rally in the form of Maratha Morcha on Wednesday. Lakhs of people from across Maharashtra will likely attend a protest march in Mumbai seeking reservations in jobs, and punishment for accused in the Kopardi case and education for the Maratha community.

This will be the 58th — and the largest — protest march of the Maratha community, exactly a year after the first march was held in Aurangabad. So far, 57 protests, in the form of 'mook morcha' (silent rallies), have been held in various parts of the state following the brutal rape and murder of a 14-year-old Maratha girl in Kopardi in Ahmednagar district in July 2016. The other demands of the community include Amendment in SC, ST (Prevention of Atrocities Act) to stop its misuse, loan waiver to curb farmer suicides, and remunerative prices for agricultural produce.

The morcha The morcha has been organised by the Sakal Maratha Samaj, an umbrella organisation of several Maratha groups and will begin at 11 am from the BMC's Jijamata Udyan and culminate at Azad Maidan in south Mumbai, the organisers said.

However, with more than five lakh members of Maratha community and an additional 10,000 vehicles likely to enter Mumbai from cities like Pune, Nashik, Kolhapur, Raigad, and Satara, the silent March is expected to cripple the city's traffic mostly during the peak hours. Therefore, to facilitate a smooth flow of vehicles, the Mumbai Traffic Police has decided to close certain roads and install diversions between Byculla and Mumbai Central to CST and Churchgate.

Seeing the size of the Maratha community that is expected to take part in the Maratha Kranti Morcha on Wednesday, the Mumbai Police, Traffic Police, BMC, Fire Brigade and intelligence units from state and Centre and other agencies held a final meeting on Tuesday to prevent any untoward incident.