Ram Viswanathan of chennailiving.blogspot.com wrote as below:
Monday, May 22, 2006
Reservation Row
The divisive politics of reservation has raised its ugly head again and there have been protest rallies and agitations all across India, but Tamil Nadu has been rather quiet in this front. In fact, there was pro-quota rally in Chennai. What else do you expect from a state where reservation is the norm and there is very little left to reserve.
Quotas in India has taken a life of its own since independence. Even Dr. Ambedkar advocated reservation for Schedule Castes & Scheduled Tribes only for 10 years. But politicians have since extended and expanded the scope to include several other communities under the backward class umbrella.
While affirmative actions elsewhere (US in particular) is aimed at numerically smaller minorities, it is the other way around in India. The focus of rigid quotas in India is aimed towards numerically majority communities. This, if not anything else makes the current anti-reservation agitation futile. Politicians of all hue and cry in India will not say or do anything that might even remotely impact their perceived vote bank.
In a recent interview with Arjun Singh, federal minister responsible for these things, Karan Thapar literally ripped him apart from various angles but the veteran politician had a stock reply "It has been decided by the Parliament and he is only implementing the will of the Parliament".
It is interesting that these Parliamentarians are very coy when comes to their own backyard and have a NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) attitude. They have repeatedly failed to allocate 1/3rd of the seats to women. If Mr. Arjun Singh is so bent on increasing the quota regimen, why not implement OBC & women quotas to all elected bodies first?
One thing is clear though, quota system has come to stay and will only proliferate. No politician will touch the reservation holy cow for the fear of getting burned. MGR tried to exclude the creamy layer but had to make a hasty retreat. He was so severely beaten in a federal election, that he not only removed the creamy layer exclusion clause but also increased the BC quota to 50%, one of the highest in India.
My take on this no different from Jawaharlal Nehru.. "I dislike any kind of reservations.." According to Karan Thapar, this is what Mr. Nehru said in 1961..
On the 27th of June 1961 wrote to the Chief Ministers of the day as follows: I dislike any kind of reservations. If we go in for any kind of reservations on communal and caste basis, we will swamp the bright and able people and remain second rate or third rate. The moment we encourage the second rate, we are lost. And then he adds pointedly: This way lies not only folly, but also disaster.
Having said that, I am for:
1. Helping the truly needy to get to ahead in life.
2. Catching them young. Having affirmative action from kindergarten levels.
3. Excluding creamy layer from any assistance / scholarship program
4. Providing tools of upliftment rather devising subjugation mechanisms
What's your take on this ?
I responded to his blog as below: [I posted as comment in his blog]
What you say on the reservations row is absolutely sensible. However, I would like to add that when seats are limited, reservations are inevitable. The question is, how do we reserve? I suppose the most sensible way is to reserve on the basis of merit. But today even a meritorious reservation would in large measure be a reservation for the moneyed. For you get better tuitions to ensure your merit. Therefore before we talk of merit, we must ensure equality of opportunity to everyone. The bottom line would be - the right to education for everyone. Even here we come back to square one - with limited seats to even basic educational institutions, whom do we reserve?
So what's the way out?
22.05.06
Should there be reservations on the basis of caste? If we reserve on the basis of caste, is it not stratifying present day Indian citizens into castes, when our ideal is to do away with the traditional caste system which we recognise was pernicious?
The fact is reservations already exist and the clamour is for more communities to be reserved. While the constitution framers’ intentions were noble and they hoped that before long there would be no need for reservations because the circumstances that necessitated reservations - the marginalisation of sections of society - would no longer exist. Now, even those who have become mainstream do not want even a review of reservations. The creamy layer yardstick suggested by the Supreme Court corrects the situation to a degree, but a more thorough evaluation of the effect of over 50 years of reservations is called for.
Though pro-reservationists criticize the merit argument of the anti-reservationists, they would have to accept some merit in the ‘merit’ argument because there is no other way they would be able to shortlist the candidates amongst the reserved category. It is always likely that there would be less seats than the number of candidates.
02.05.06
Anti reservationists are never going to go far because the pro-reservationists are simply a larger number. So there is no point in raising the issue on the basis of reasonableness of the stand. It is going to be resolved only on the basis of who is going to muster large public support and the only way the pro and anti divisions can be resolved, taking all the complexities of history and current ground realities, particularly political realities into account is to reserve everyone on the following basis:
a) Merit – a certain percentage for the top scorers.
b) Wealth – a certain percentage for the moneyed – seats on bid.
c) Caste basis – a certain percentage to be reserved on basis of caste – within that percentage reservation according to caste percentage.
d) Poverty basis – a certain percentage for the poorest economically. The choice should be given to everyone to be tabulated as they wish either under economic category or caste category. Once they categorize themselves either way, then that should be considered permanent.
e) Sportsmen – a certain percentage for those who excel in sports.
f) Physically handicapped – a certain percentage for those who are physically handicapped.
The above is a suggestive list. Many more categories can be added.
A list like the above should not be applicable concern by concern. That is, mandating that each institution should have all the categories each time it recruits. This is simply not pragmatic. We could say for every block of 100 employees recruited, but again there would be problems if it was a small recruitment of say 5 executives of top management that were being recruited. To get over this, we must adopt the following principle:
When the recruitment is only 1 person, then all the categories should be considered as just one category and the best should be chosen.
When there are two persons to be recruited, then it must be from the only two categories that all the categories would be broken up into. It would simply be, say, upper and lower. Upper here meaning caste wise, money wise, merit wise etc. and lower being poor caste wise, money wise and physique wise etc.
Monday, May 22, 2006
Reservation Row
The divisive politics of reservation has raised its ugly head again and there have been protest rallies and agitations all across India, but Tamil Nadu has been rather quiet in this front. In fact, there was pro-quota rally in Chennai. What else do you expect from a state where reservation is the norm and there is very little left to reserve.
Quotas in India has taken a life of its own since independence. Even Dr. Ambedkar advocated reservation for Schedule Castes & Scheduled Tribes only for 10 years. But politicians have since extended and expanded the scope to include several other communities under the backward class umbrella.
While affirmative actions elsewhere (US in particular) is aimed at numerically smaller minorities, it is the other way around in India. The focus of rigid quotas in India is aimed towards numerically majority communities. This, if not anything else makes the current anti-reservation agitation futile. Politicians of all hue and cry in India will not say or do anything that might even remotely impact their perceived vote bank.
In a recent interview with Arjun Singh, federal minister responsible for these things, Karan Thapar literally ripped him apart from various angles but the veteran politician had a stock reply "It has been decided by the Parliament and he is only implementing the will of the Parliament".
It is interesting that these Parliamentarians are very coy when comes to their own backyard and have a NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) attitude. They have repeatedly failed to allocate 1/3rd of the seats to women. If Mr. Arjun Singh is so bent on increasing the quota regimen, why not implement OBC & women quotas to all elected bodies first?
One thing is clear though, quota system has come to stay and will only proliferate. No politician will touch the reservation holy cow for the fear of getting burned. MGR tried to exclude the creamy layer but had to make a hasty retreat. He was so severely beaten in a federal election, that he not only removed the creamy layer exclusion clause but also increased the BC quota to 50%, one of the highest in India.
My take on this no different from Jawaharlal Nehru.. "I dislike any kind of reservations.." According to Karan Thapar, this is what Mr. Nehru said in 1961..
On the 27th of June 1961 wrote to the Chief Ministers of the day as follows: I dislike any kind of reservations. If we go in for any kind of reservations on communal and caste basis, we will swamp the bright and able people and remain second rate or third rate. The moment we encourage the second rate, we are lost. And then he adds pointedly: This way lies not only folly, but also disaster.
Having said that, I am for:
1. Helping the truly needy to get to ahead in life.
2. Catching them young. Having affirmative action from kindergarten levels.
3. Excluding creamy layer from any assistance / scholarship program
4. Providing tools of upliftment rather devising subjugation mechanisms
What's your take on this ?
I responded to his blog as below: [I posted as comment in his blog]
What you say on the reservations row is absolutely sensible. However, I would like to add that when seats are limited, reservations are inevitable. The question is, how do we reserve? I suppose the most sensible way is to reserve on the basis of merit. But today even a meritorious reservation would in large measure be a reservation for the moneyed. For you get better tuitions to ensure your merit. Therefore before we talk of merit, we must ensure equality of opportunity to everyone. The bottom line would be - the right to education for everyone. Even here we come back to square one - with limited seats to even basic educational institutions, whom do we reserve?
So what's the way out?
22.05.06
Should there be reservations on the basis of caste? If we reserve on the basis of caste, is it not stratifying present day Indian citizens into castes, when our ideal is to do away with the traditional caste system which we recognise was pernicious?
The fact is reservations already exist and the clamour is for more communities to be reserved. While the constitution framers’ intentions were noble and they hoped that before long there would be no need for reservations because the circumstances that necessitated reservations - the marginalisation of sections of society - would no longer exist. Now, even those who have become mainstream do not want even a review of reservations. The creamy layer yardstick suggested by the Supreme Court corrects the situation to a degree, but a more thorough evaluation of the effect of over 50 years of reservations is called for.
Though pro-reservationists criticize the merit argument of the anti-reservationists, they would have to accept some merit in the ‘merit’ argument because there is no other way they would be able to shortlist the candidates amongst the reserved category. It is always likely that there would be less seats than the number of candidates.
02.05.06
Anti reservationists are never going to go far because the pro-reservationists are simply a larger number. So there is no point in raising the issue on the basis of reasonableness of the stand. It is going to be resolved only on the basis of who is going to muster large public support and the only way the pro and anti divisions can be resolved, taking all the complexities of history and current ground realities, particularly political realities into account is to reserve everyone on the following basis:
a) Merit – a certain percentage for the top scorers.
b) Wealth – a certain percentage for the moneyed – seats on bid.
c) Caste basis – a certain percentage to be reserved on basis of caste – within that percentage reservation according to caste percentage.
d) Poverty basis – a certain percentage for the poorest economically. The choice should be given to everyone to be tabulated as they wish either under economic category or caste category. Once they categorize themselves either way, then that should be considered permanent.
e) Sportsmen – a certain percentage for those who excel in sports.
f) Physically handicapped – a certain percentage for those who are physically handicapped.
The above is a suggestive list. Many more categories can be added.
A list like the above should not be applicable concern by concern. That is, mandating that each institution should have all the categories each time it recruits. This is simply not pragmatic. We could say for every block of 100 employees recruited, but again there would be problems if it was a small recruitment of say 5 executives of top management that were being recruited. To get over this, we must adopt the following principle:
When the recruitment is only 1 person, then all the categories should be considered as just one category and the best should be chosen.
When there are two persons to be recruited, then it must be from the only two categories that all the categories would be broken up into. It would simply be, say, upper and lower. Upper here meaning caste wise, money wise, merit wise etc. and lower being poor caste wise, money wise and physique wise etc.
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