The modern thinking Indian

Probably a major under-statement, given the events so far over the 2 separate agitations that has taken place in 2007, and 2008. Crores worth of public property has been destroyed, the railways has lost massively both because of destruction of railways lines and equipment and due to large scale cancellation of trains. Tourism in the region will take a knock (especially with the bombs of just a few weeks back in Jaipur) with advisories already having been issued and coverage of these protests in the international media; and normal people have been put to massive hardships. But, this is not the end. As long as the politics of reservation will keep on getting patronized by various Governments, they will face such kind of issues. For example, who would have believed that the North East could see such a problem:

SHILLONG: As protests of the Gujjars, who are demanding ST status, spread to fresh areas, the community living in the North-East will also take up the cudgels and launch an agitation in support of the cause.
Representatives of the community from the entire region met in Guwahati on Friday to chalk out a programme to join the protests.

There is no good solution. If the Government bows down to these demands and grants them the ST status (it makes no logic to give the Gujjar community an ST tag, the only reason is that the Jats have been granted OBC, and hence the Gujjar community sees the ST as a way to get more benefit of reservations, and hence these pressure tactics of violence). If they do get such benefits, then other communities will also want to avail of similar benefits, and this is a very slippery slope to go down. Already, both the Central and Rajasthan government have come under fire for letting the agitations causing so much disturbance.
The courts also know this, and from time to time, they have asked the Governments about whether there is plan to take empowered communities out of the net so that only the truly backward get such benefits, but any political party will find it suicidal to remove reservations for any benefit. And yet, parties continue on this policy, well knowing that any benefit is only transient, and other parties will also try to garner the same benefit. As an example of Governments trying to provide reservations even when courts have ruled against this, here is an example of the Tamil Nadu Government providing reservations on the basis of religion:

The Tamil Nadu government on Friday issued orders to "ensure" that Muslims and Christians got 3.5% reservation each in government services to overcome some 'practical problems' faced by the two communities in availing the benefit.

The Andhra Pradesh Government attempts in this regard have been periodically rejected by courts, yet here is another State Government trying the same.

Labels: BJP, Caste, Congress, Empowerment, Law, Minority, Muslim, Parliament, Politics, Railways, Reservations, Responsibility, Security

It is a known fact of life that there are many communities in India that are backward; many of them get benefits on the basis of caste such as reservations in jobs and education. There is some debate on a policy of reservation, but the prime justification is that these castes have been suppressed as part of social and religious practices; there is also a whole host of politics involved in this whole affair.
It is this problem of politics that causes most problems; for some time now, the Congress has realized that it has been losing the support of Muslims, and this is not something that the Congress can easily accept. In order to regain power in the states and center, it needs to bring together a coalition of many parts of society such as the Dalits (except in Uttar Pradesh where Mayawati has got their support), forward castes such as the Brahmins, and the Muslims. Hence, a concerted plan to take measures that would be seen as benefiting the Muslim community; it is these that are now causing it problems.
The Government asked to get numbers of Muslims in the armed forces (something that was vigorously opposed); it wanted to get banks to apportion a certain amount of loans for the minorities (something even banks were unsure of in terms of implementation); the Andhra Pradesh Government tried to bring in reservation for Muslims (in spite of the Court rejecting it more than once). These policies, especially ones dealing with promising reservation to the backward section in the Muslim community have even come under fire from Muslim leaders. Islam as a religion has strict policies against any form of discrimination, and proclaim the equality of all before Allah, and to say that there are caste like discriminations in the community goes against the very concept.
So, the Government has now come under some severe questioning from the High Court:

The Central government came in for some searing criticism by Delhi HC on Monday with respect to implementation of Sachar Committee recommendations for welfare of Muslims. "You are trying to please one community. Poverty is the common enemy. You should fight against poverty rather than saying that you would fight against poverty for one community only," the bench observed during the hearing.
The bench wondered why the government's benevolence was targeted at one community alone, "You are saying that more money be spent for one minority community. Should it not cut across caste and religion? Does the Sachar committee say that facilities are available to other communities?" the HC demanded.

It is further likely as the election comes closer, the Government will move closer to trying to provide for pleasing the Muslim community, and will keep on facing both political opposition and in the Courts. In addition, the Constitution of India forbids any sort of religious discrimination. What the Government needs to do is to take less political pleasing but more effective steps such as increase education facilities, promote role models, try and increase integration, and stop treating them as a vote base to be milked.

Labels: Congress, Discrimination, Education, Muslim, Reform, Reservations

In a move that indicates that the Government has apparently not done its homework on getting its allies on board on the move to introduce the Women's Reservation Bill, the Rashtriya Janta Dal (RJD) (whose head Laloo Prasad Yadav and other leaders are part of the Government) has opposed the move by the Government and accused it of taking the action without consulting its allies. The Mandal parties want the women's quota to have sub-quotas for OBC's and Muslims, something that the other parties and many sections of the Congress support base will oppose:

The Rashtriya Janata Dal on Wednesday upped its opposition to the women's reservation Bill threatening to withdraw support to the UPA government if the legislation was not amended to provide sub-quotas for OBCs and Muslims within the generic gender quota in legislatures.
In a development which undercut the PM's effort to dispel the perception of a split in the UPA over the women's quota, the RJD accused the Congress leadership of rushing through the Bill without hammering out a consensus. RJD's aggressive posture was yet another instance of how OBC resentment over the "present form" of women's quota had strained ties between allies. Early on, RJD leadership fielded party MP Devendra Yadav to warn the Congress leadership not to mistake its protest to be just pyrotechnics. Yadav said his party would go to any extent to thwart the passage of the already-delayed legislation.

This reaction was somewhat expected, but there are unexpected movements also happening. First, the RJD is a part of the ruling coalition and is part of the Government, so the fact that it is complaining about the introduction of the legislation means that discussions about this long-delayed bill really did not move to a conclusion.
In addition, there seems to be a sudden amount of tension between the natural allies of SP and the CPM, given that they are on opposite sides of the Bill. Reservation in legislature on the basis of caste and religion are very touchy subjects and will be the first thing to be opposed in court as being unconstitutional.

Labels: Caste, Congress, Election, Law, Left, Parliament, Politics, Reservations, Women

When the Government decided to go around the Supreme Court ruling that disallowed reservation for SC/ST's in private unaided educational institutions, the Congress would never have visualized the can of worms that got opened. In a sign of intra-party power plays (or the desperation of a neglected man to make his mark), the education minister used the powers in the new law to propose reservations for OBC's in educational institutions. And of course, given the state of our polity and the political implications of OBC support, there is not a single party in the country that would go against this proposal. The proposal however horrified a number of students, who were aghast at the idea of a massive increase in the number of reserved seats in educational institutions, including the 'elite' ones such as AIIMS, IIT's, and IIM's.
Given that any number of agitations were not going to stop the Government, pushed to the backfront by the pressure of their allies, eager to see these quotas implemented. The case naturally went directly to the Supreme Court, which initially itself pushed the Government on the backfront by staying the implementation of the law, and asked a number of hard questions to which the Congress did not have many answers. The Government tried hard to defuse a growing upper caste anger / backlash by promising that seats would be increased so that current general seats would not be affected, and institutions would be given additional funding so that they would increase infrastructure accordingly. The Congress knows that they would not be able to harness any of the OBC seat anyway, these are promised to the regional parties that bank on the OBC vote.
And finally the Supreme Court has delivered its judgment, a fair amount of time after the law was proposed. The Supreme Court has decided against a direct confrontation with parliament by not blocking the law, and giving Parliament the right to make laws regarding affirmative action. However, it laid down some parameters that make things different for the Congress; first by ensuring that the principle of creamy layer (people already empowered and not needing a further boost) to be removed (a good thing, since it ensures that OBC's in cities do not get all the seats as opposed to the backward castes who can use the help of reservation); further, in a principle that is being debated to some extent, the majority of the Court observed that a person who is a graduate does not need a boost up (thus effectively ruling out reservations in post-graduate courses such as IIM's and IIT's); finally the court made observations regarding the utility of reviewing the lists of castes needing this support every 5 years (a observation that every party will ignore).
Overall, the Supreme Court ruling is controversial, not making anybody happy. However, the court has decided that it will not challenge the supreme principle of Parliament (otherwise there would have been a direct confrontation), but has set many constraints.

Labels: Congress, Court, Discrimination, Education, Law, Minority, Parliament, Politics, Reservations

What happens when a Government is so taken up by populism that it won't listen to reason ? Well, now is a good time to find out. The Andhra Pradesh Government of Y. Rajsekhar Reddy has been trying to implement a separate reservation quota for Muslims in state colleges. Now reservation vs. merit has been a tricky subject currently, with plenty of impassioned speech for and against the subject. However, most debaters seem to agree that trying to implement reservations with a religious agenda is just not on; it smacks too much of a populist move (not bad by itself if it works for public good), it goes against the concept of the state not discriminating between against religions (sacrosanct in the Indian system), it militates against the concept of targeted reservations where reservations are only meant for those people who have been denied or suppressed for a historically long time (and you just cannot say that about the Muslim community in Andhra Pradesh) and is against the concept of judicial review where the ultimate correctness of a Government action is viewed against the intention of the constitution by the courts (and in this case, this particular stand is being reviewed by the Supreme Court).
So what did the Andhra Government do ? 2 years back, it passed an ordinance whereby a 5 % reservation was introduced for the entire Muslim community in Andhra Pradesh. Most people considered this an obvious attempt to curry favour with the Muslim community since the Government knew what was going to happen (it would not pass court approval with the High Court very clearly ruling against providing reservation on a religious basis). So the state filed an appeal with the Supreme Court, although it knows that the Supreme Court is very very likely to rule against such an ordinance and declare it ultra vires of the Constitution.
Then in July this year, the Andhra Pradesh Congress Government struck again, passing another ordinance giving 4 % (and not 5%) reservation in Professional colleges for Muslims. This is when the Supreme Court is already hearing the earlier case. And the Government must have felt to be very clever, after it all reduced the figure to 4% so as to not exceed the 50% quota limit introduced by the Supreme Court in the landmark Indira Sawhney case. Now, this latest quota has been challenged in the Supreme Court again:

The Supreme Court would hear on September 24, a petition challenging the Constitutional validity of an Ordinance granting four per cent reservation to Muslims in professional colleges by the Andhra Pradesh government.
The petition filed by T Murlidhar Rao and K Sriteja has challenged the Andhra Pradesh High Court order declining to stay the Ordinance issued by the state government on July 6, 2007, under which it provided four per cent reservations to several sub sects within the Muslim community by treating them as backward classes. The High Court refused to stay the ordinance after the state government submitted that the issue relating to reservation for OBCs was pending before the apex court and hence no order be passed till the matter was adjudicated by the Constitution Bench.

The State Government submitted before the High Court that since a matter related to OBC reservation in professional educational institutions was pending before the Supreme Court, the Andhra High Court should not intervene, and the court bought into this argument. The fact of the matter is that this is different, since this pertains to reservation on religious lines, and is a much more serious manner. But will the Congress listen ? It needs to be seen as implementing the Sachar committee report and doing something symbolic for the Muslim community, and this trend is hard to reverse.

Labels: Congress, Court, Development, Discrimination, Education, Governance, Judicial, Law, Muslim, Politics, Reservations

In a major blow to the Congress hopes of securing a vacation of the stay order on the reservation for OBC's in educational institutions, the Court has refused to vacate the stay. This is a continuing drama, given that a few months back, when the Supreme Court had heard this case, it had make its objections clear. There were 2 fundamental grounds for objections as laid down by the court:
1. There is no data to back up the decision to use a 27% reservation. It seems more like that the Government did not want to cross the 50% limit set in the Indira Sawhney case, and hence it used the difference between 50% and current reservation levels of 22.5%. One can be pretty confident that this was the reasoning used by the Congress. The last caste based census was conducted by the British in 1931, which was 75 years ago, and there is no guarantee that data from that was collected accurately; in addition, to use such data for current purposes would be useless because of the time gap.
2. In addition, the Government refused to set aside reservation for the creamy layer. The Court have made it clear from the beginning that they do not approve of the rich, upper sections of the reserved classes availing of quota, since they have equal opportunity as anybody else. This is something that the Government finally conceded to after so many months of refusal; primarily in order to try and get the court to remove the stay. However, it is difficult to remove the creamy layer as all the politicians will automatically get excluded and this would not be something that they would agree to.
The reservation game has been a pet project of Arjun Singh (the same one accused of harassing his daughter-in-law for dowry) in order to try and bring about a place for himself in the party. However, this does not seem to have worked, and has instead landed the Congress in a soup. Predictably, for any electoral benefits, there are a whole host of caste-based parties waiting to claim the benefits; the Congress, because it tries to preserve its pan-society appeal, will not try to win votes on the basis of this reservation to avoid pushing the forward castes against it. It's stuck both ways.
Recently, in the Gujjar agitation, we saw how a society, attracted by the promise of reserved jobs, will try to declare itself as a backward caste, and at the same time, a caste already claiming the benefits (the Meenas) will do what they can to try and prevent their share of the pie from reducing. Instead of trying to get away from caste based politics and development, we are doing the opposite.

Labels: Caste, Congress, Court, Development, Discrimination, Education, Governance, Politics, Reservations

The Government is really going the whole hog in terms of providing reservations, including in areas not mandated by the constitution. In a petition before the Supreme Court, it has hauled up the Government for mandating reservation in catering contracts allocated by Indian Railways. If you don't really believe this, read this reference:

The Centre’s policy of providing reservation to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes and minorities in commercial contracts has come under Supreme Court scanner. The apex court has asked the Centre to explain why preferential treatment was being accorded to such groups in awarding catering tenders of the Indian Railways. The court also directed continuation of its interim order. It had restrained the railway authorities from finalising the tenders.
“Article 16 provides for reservation in public employment. Article 15 (5) deals with policy of reservation in education. Similarly, the state is empowered to come up with special provision for the advancement for SCs, STs and OBCs,” the SC noted. “But does awarding of commercial contracts fall within any of the above-mentioned articles?” it asked. “Under which constitutional provision, you (Centre) are giving preferential treatment to minorities in commercial matters?” the court sought to know from the country’s top law official.

These are a series of cases in which the Government's political impulses are being challenged by the top court of the country. If this case continues, doubtless there will be more politicians who will come in and either ask the court to stay off, or ask the court to stay away from operational matters. So a little background in civics. The legislature (parliament) makes laws, the executive (government) is involved in operational details and essentially running the country as per these laws, and the courts (with the Supreme Court at the head) is the decision maker in terms of whether these policies and laws meet the test of being indeed lawful. These tests are done on the basis of using the constitution as a benchmark, as the basis for decisions. So, it is absolutely not necessary that just because the government makes a policy or parliament makes a law, it is absolute. Only a just law is a correct law, and like most countries governed by the constitution, we have the courts as the final decision making body (we need to have a final decision making body).
Now, in this case, the government set out a policy where it decided that a portion of the contracts should be decided on the basis of the caste of the groups applying for catering. In commercial contracts, that too put out by the government, there needs to be absolute clarity, with all entities involved being sure that they have an equal chance as per their abilities, and the current reservation policy is a clear violation of the honesty required in such contracts.
Secondly, from time to time, the courts have always held that reservations, even where held valid, should be held valid only when the creamy layer have been excluded. The creamy layer is the section of people in the caste who are of a significant socio-economic status (such as with quality of education, income, etc) that they don't need reservation to uplift them. Does anybody have any doubt that people applying for railways catering contracts don't already have the required social class and money with them that they don't need any special permission.
My guess is that in this case as well, the government will have no clear reason or statute of law that it can quote for having this policy, and eventually the policy will be declared illegal, along with some more stinging remarks at the political reasons behind such a policy. This policy, especially for something like the railways that is more prominent in smaller states and semi-urban areas, was meant more to be advertised as a political measure, notwithstanding the fact that it was actually discriminatory.

Labels: Caste, Congress, Court, Discrimination, Governance, India, Law, Minority, Politics, Reform, Reservations

The Congress government is again going to make efforts to get the Supreme Court to remove its stay on the controversial issue of reservations in educational institutions for OBC's.

The Centre has sought vacating the March 29 order. The Centre said, it was approaching with the application for vacation of interim order of March 29 as certain facts and circumstances were discovered subsequently.
It submitted that in case the stay continues to be operative, a large number of candidates selected against the seats reserved for the OBCs would not be available to get admission and would lose precious one year.

The Government still has not answered the 2 main questions about where the data for the reservations that it has put in place is coming from. The last caste census was done in 1931, and the Government is hesitant to admit in court that it will use results from a census done in 1931 (76 years back), that too, done under the British India supervision and with doubtful accuracy, to form the basis for a sweeping educational reservation policy. The fact remains that the Congress has no basis except for political reasons to make these reservations. The figure was decided so that the total number can add upto less than 50%, the threshold that the court has used in the past as the total permissible limit. Crass intra-Congress politics decided the basis for this reservation, and the Congress will continue to pay for it. If it really cared for getting a good education to all, it would provide accountability in terms of getting a good educational system with facilities (not ramshackle buildings) and teachers who are present (rather than a large number of absentee teachers in rural areas); but these things do not pay politically.
The Government still has not answered the other question as well about trying to explain away as to why creamy layers have not been removed from those trying to get the benefit of reservation. The creamy layer, consisting of the privileged caste members tend to have a leg-up in terms of facilities, and corner most of the benefits anyway. So, if educational reservations for OBC's were available with the creamy layer intact, you would tend to find that people in cities, indistinguishable from anybody else (except that they have a caste certificate) will take most of the seats, leaving the poor OBC exactly as they were. Of course, most politicians belong in the creamy layer, so it is impossible to think that they will try and support the exclusion of the creamy layer.

Labels: Caste, Community, Congress, Court, Development, Empowerment, Governance, India, Law, Politics, Reservations

The private sector in India is one of the least caste or religious conscious sectors. The private sector, at least bigger businesses and not lala companies, are in the business of making money and want the best of talent and could not care less if the first appelation is Mr. or Ms., cannot care less if the last name is a Gupta or a Ahmed or a Yadav or a Das or any other name. I have first hand experience in that, having been on the interviewing and selection board for candidates, and I have never heard any discussion about the sex or religion or caste of employees. Now there can be many naysayers who complain that smaller companies are more discriminatory, or that the number of applicants is itself skewed in terms of ratios of these different castes such that equally qualified SC/ST candidates are harder to find.
These are all spurious reasons. Businesses are in it to make money, and for that, they need the best of talent. In addition, with anti-discriminatory laws so harsh, it does not seem possible that companies can have policies percolating down to the rank and file that promote discrimination. Now, I am sure that it is true that there are lesser candidates of SC/ST who apply, but that is a failure of the education system. We have had reservation of 22.5% for SC/ST candidates since after independence, and we should be generating enough candidates to make their percentage. The main problem is that the Government has not effectively tackled the discrimination that happens in our rural areas where such discrimination against SC/ST in terms of facilities do happen. I have seen numerous villages where SC's are on the outside, and to change things requires more education and strict application of non-discriminatory policies; which is something that the Government in most states as well as the central Government have failed to do. However, it is not a solution to insist on reservation in non-public companies as the minister Ram Vilas Paswan and earlier Meira Kumar were insisting on:

A day after industry leaders conveyed their opposition to job reservation to the PMO, union minister Ram Vilas Paswan said nothing short of a legislation would guarantee work for SCs/STs in the private sector. Saying India was firmly on the road of globalisation, he suggested that the private sector should begin by recruiting SCs/STs in class III and IV category jobs besides imparting training to class I and II employees.
His reaction came a day after the industry chambers led by their respective presidents and former presidents met Principal Secretary to Prime Minister T K A Nair opposed any legislation on job quota in the private sector.

Industry has a social commitment, but this social commitment falls in the nature of enriching its surroundings, its employees, the neighboring environment, the shareholders, and in general, increasing the wealth of the nation. A key way to do that is to marshal its resources in the best possible way. Forcing reservation on the industry, with its attendant problems regarding reservations in promotions (a merit-based system currently), backlogs causing increasing pressure due to need to fill backlogs tends to cause an incredible amount of pressure.
Whenever there is a discussion around reservation, it always falls to the following argument, 'what is the problem in reserving jobs for SC/ST's since they are equally qualified'? This is a circular argument, since if they are equally qualified, then why would they need reservation, and if they are not qualified in sufficient percentage, then industry should not be forced to take them. As always, the Government really has no answers as to why they cannot take the required long term measures that will really benefit SC/ST's and OBC's: namely, crack down on the educational system so that they get equal and great education, and ensure that any form of discrimination is investigated and punished if found true.
Instead, there is going to be a greater push for reservation in private sector, something that the courts will surely overturn if it is passed by parliament.

Labels: Caste, Congress, Court, Development, Discrimination, Empowerment, Governance, India, Minority, Parliament, Politics, Reform, Reservations

The Congress government in Andhra Pradesh is at it again. After being rebuffed by the courts earlier in an attempt to implement a separate reservation quota for Muslims, they are trying again. The constitution is clear, reservations were only considered due to the centuries of discrimination against the Scheduled Castes and Tribes resulting in their being very repressed, and reservation could be one of the measures to bring them up. Because no one wants to be seen as removing reservation, it is likely to be with us for a very long time.
However, what causes a problem is when the reservations are seen as a pure political tool, and this is what the Congress is guilty of. The reservations for OBC's were also first implemented by V P Singh as a move to checkmate his ambitious deputy Devi Lal, and have been sought to be extended in the education area by Arjun Singh as a measure by the wily thakur to get a support base for himself. However, the Congress, being a broad based party has always suffered from not being able to fully tom-tom its reservation agenda due to fear of alienating other castes (as seen freshly in the Gujjar-Meena issue). In this case as well, the Congress will end up with egg on its face.

The Andhra Pradesh government’s decision to promulgate an ordinance on 4% Muslim quota, despite it having been struck down twice, is seen as part of Congress strategy to gamble on a clutch of double-edged issues to consolidate its support base for bigger battles ahead.
The Congress leadership is anticipating judicial intervention even though the state has repackaged religious reservation on Mandal lines, as passed by the AP cabinet on Wednesday. The insistence on Muslim quota, despite serious apprehensions, may confound observers but a senior AP leader said it was meant to prove its commitment to the community’s welfare. Having won the points with Muslims with three attempts, the state is unlikely to push it further in case of a fresh judicial roadblock.

This is pure politics , and nothing else. In order to show the Muslim community that the Congress is the one that is concerned about their welfare, the political party will try to do something that they know is not going to succeed. But as usual, these are short-term measures.
In order to get actual development of the Muslim community, the Government (Congress in this case) needs to take actual measures that result in development, such as providing good education, helping the artisans who are affected by rapid industrialization, providing good role models, and so on. The basic problem with reservations is that it provides a good handle to the political community to claim that they are working for the benefit of disadvantaged communities without having to do any actual work.
In addition, this move to separate the Muslim community based on reservation benefit available or not is deplorable. Hinduism has tolerated in the past severe discrimination among its adherents on the basis of caste, but Islam has severe strictures against any discrimination among its adherents, and the state should not try and implement some. It is time that the Muslim community saw through such pretenses and favor people who actually work for their benefit.
But the Congress will continue on this line, it needs to line up support for the AP next elections in 2009, and with its relations with the Telangana Rashtra Samiti on a nadir, it needs more measures; apparently just working for people and improving their lot is not enough.

Labels: Caste, Community, Congress, Development, Discrimination, Election, Governance, India, Minority, Muslim, Politics, Reform, Reservations, Welfare

This entire issue of the Gujjar protest to get Scheduled Tribe status now looks to blow away for a few months, till the time that the committee setup to look into the issue. But one thing is clear, that no one from the political arena anticipated that things will take such a turn. As the position currently stands, it is a lose-lose situation for politicians, and they realize that the reservation flame can burn all of them. Otherwise, if a fire was burning in a BJP ruled state, where elections are due in a short while, and there is some amount of internal dissension, would the Congress be mostly silent ?
I was listening to the news and reading the papers everyday, and the most important news was the one missing. The Congress President, spokesperson, and sundry other people from the Congress and the other non-BJP parties, none of them made the usual noises about the BJP not fulfilling an electoral promise, about the government not keeping violence in control, about dismissing the Government for an apparent collapse. Instead, when Sachin Pilot raised his voice once, that was the last time he raised his voice; and you had the Prime Minister down trying to keep things in control. At the same time, violence was tolerated so that a community does not get aggrieved against the political party.
And that brings us to our prime topic. The issue of reservation and politics in India has spun out of control. Reservations were seen as a way to get people who are down-trodden and crushed by other parts of society a leg-up. I can't disagree with that. However, over time, it has got so political that the original purpose is getting lost. Would somebody be willing to believe that a rural community, usually very proud of itself, would say that it wants to be classified as a Scheduled Tribe, the lowest in the ladder. Anybody looking at the situation from an honest angle would not classify the Gurjjar community as a ST community.
But reservations are now the best way to get government jobs; in the administration, in the police, and other groups that make a difference to society, especially so in a rural area. It is not anymore about social uplifting, the single point agenda being to get a better share of government jobs. And there is ample precedent in this case. The prime users of the ST label in Rajasthan is the Meena community, and they corner most of the offices reserved for ST's. The Gujjar community got added to the OBC list after an agitation some time back, but are now losing out to the Jats who they see as better in terms of economic and developmental models, and hence more likely to corner a share of the reservations. So, add the Gujjars to the ST list as they are demanding? Not so fast, if the Gujjars get added, the Meena community will start to feel that their domination of the ST seats is under threar, and that is not something that is going to be tolerated. Hence, the Meena community gathered as a large group, numbering more than 50,000 (as per the papers), gathered a huge quantity of weapons, and set out to have a peaceful non-violent discussion with the Gujjar villages. Only the army and police prevented these 2 extremely peace loving groups from meeting and creating a river of blood.
What is a poor, well intentioned politician likely to do ? Set up a committee and push the decision out. Taking a decision (either yes or no) would have large repercussions in terms of voter base, and with both the Meena and Gujjar community on the warpath, it would only have been a lose-lose decision.
This is something that is to be expected. Reservations, without any good targeting of the people needing this kind of help, will be seen as an entitlement, and something to be defended. What will happen now ? Politicians, especially of the Congress variety are starting to see that the reservation bandwagon that they are championing is not giving them any benefits. Political benefits are cornered by the specific caste focused parties, urban voters start punishing them, and the courts ask hard questions for which they have no answers. In addition, their supporting parties raise hell with them about not getting the reservations implemented.
One would like to say at this point that politicians deserve this, but this is bigger. It affects our country. These sort of agitations deepen caste divisions, create economic misery, ruin portions of the economy such as tourism, and affect the aam admi (daily wage earners). We need to bring people not getting the benefits of growth into a life of improvement, but not through short term measures. Targeted benefits to people in terms of more education, more facilities, and even reservation (but focused, else the creamy layer will skim it all away). Does one really believe that politicians will listen ?

Labels: BJP, Caste, Community, Court, Development, Discrimination, Election, Governance, India, Minority, Police, Protest, Reservations