Essay on Caste-based Reservation: Reflection of Systemic Maladies : The Frankenstein’s monster of caste-based reservation in government and non-government jobs and academic institutions keeps rising from the ashes like the proverbial Phoenix. The issue which needs discussion and reflection is that as to whether we really need such a thing of the proclamation of the Indian Constitution. But if we still have to contend with the reservation demon, the reason lies in our failure to ensure an equitable and egalitarian process of value allocations, thereby necessitating the continued existence of the caste-based system.
Essay on Caste-based Reservation: Reflection of Systemic Maladies
The Frankenstein’s monster of
caste-based reservation in government and non-government jobs and academic
institutions keeps rising from the ashes like the proverbial Phoenix. The issue
which needs discussion and reflection is that as to whether we really need such
a thing of the proclamation of the Indian Constitution. But if we still have to
contend with the reservation demon, the reason lies in our failure to ensure an
equitable and egalitarian process of value allocations, thereby necessitating
the continued existence of the caste-based system.
The truth is that something as
obnoxious as caste-based reservation should not have been there all in the
first instance, but as they say a la Aristotle and many others that ‘equals
should be treated equally and unequally’. And in a society wracked by myriad
societal divisions including those of caste, some remedial measures were
required for sure to restore the societal balance before each citizen is able
to have an equal opportunity for one’s personal growth.
After all, you cannot expect those
discriminated against for thousands of years to be treated equally with those
sections of the society who have dominated the societal pecking order for
aeons. If some of us proffer the argument of merit and competence and say that
all the sections of the society should be treated equally, the same emanates
from the prejudices inherited by us member of an ossified social hierarchy to
which we belong. We may not even be aware of such prejudices, but still we
pronounce and advance them convincingly simply because they suit our own vested
interests. After all, there is a world of difference between the societal
stratum at the top and bottom of the society in terms of competence, social
confidence, cultural capital, social surroundings, appreciation of varied
societal realities and opportunities, understanding of their own
self-interests, and even genetic make-up.
So, reservation in the garb of
‘affirmative discrimination’ was needed in the first instance is something
beyond doubt, if at all, to facilitate and prepare a level playing field to all
sections of the society. But then, its continued existence can be explained
only in terms of competitive and populist politics coupled with an innate
inability of our political parties to find better issues for mass mobilisation.
Had we succeeded in providing the weaker and marginalised sections of our
society with all the bare minimum necessities of human existence, the same
people would have revolted against such a system or, at least, the issue of
reservation would have ceased to matter in Indian politics.
But the fact remains that even today
we have not been able to provide the quality education and health services to
all, particularly those on the margins of the society. It has created a status
gulf in terms of competence and abilities between the privileged and
not-so-privileged sections of the Indian society. The weaker section of the
society is naturally disadvantaged vis-a-vis the socially dominant not only
because of a long historical discrimination, but also because of the systemic
biases and prejudices heaped against them. Since we could not ensure quality education
and health services to them all these sixty years of our independence whereby
they could have competed on equal footing with the historically privileged
section of the society, hence the reservation genie keeps popping out of the
bottle.
We know it very well that in a
democracy it is the numbers which count. When the weak and underprivileged in
an underdeveloped democratic society are left to fend for themselves, they
quite naturally fall back on the strength of their numbers. The social
demography then starts dictating politics and numbers start doubling up as a
resource to be capitalised on for the purpose of improving one’s societal
status. That is what has been happening in India for quite some time, seeing
the rise of many caste-based political parties and interest groups.
If we take a look at the turn of
recent political developments, we would find that political parties have become
more specialised, representing more or less their caste constituents and the
latter also somehow gives credence to such parties in the hope of getting a
better deal. So, democratic expression and representation have taken a
grotesque turn in Indian society in the form of caste-based reservation and
politics. That is why, India being a plural society of different societal
groups is today governed by a coalition government whose constituents are
invariably the representatives of different societal groups. Such groups have
been feeding and fattening on identity politics which has been on ascendance in
recent times.
These are all the signs of a backward
and retrograde society. But such parochial thinking shall continue to dominate
our political culture until and unless we succeed in promising and ensuring a
real level playing field for all sections of the society. Investment in one’s
human resources is the first condition for the healthy growth of any society.
Recognising this fact, John Stuart Mill had remarked long back, ‘You cannot
think of becoming a great country with small men with small capacities, small
thinking and dubious character.’
Caste-based reservation, however, also
has had a functional role in our social system, negative though it may appear
prima facie. Be it noted that many of India’s time twins in Asia, Africa, Latin
America and the Caribbean have fallen by the wayside in their developmental
march. But if India has been growing from strength to strength, the reason
somewhere also lies in the way India has tried to balance the different
societal forces through a consociational system whereby societal values have
been judiciously allocated amongst different sections and strata of the Indian
society. So, while many of these societies saw bloody revolution resulting
either in their break-up or their getting reduced to the status of ‘a failed
society’, India has been experiencing a ‘passive revolution’ where positive
changes have come gradually, through different pulls and pressures, almost to
the satisfaction of all.
The recent Supreme Court judgement to
exclude the creamy layer from the benefits of reservation should be welcomed,
but the exclusion should also be extended to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled
Tribes, because what is sauce for the goose ought to be the sauce for the
gander. The argument which applies to OBCs for exclusion of its creamy layer
from the reservation benefits also applies mutatis mutandis to the creamy layer
from SCs/STs. However, the concept and criteria of the creamy layer itself
suffers from many anomalies and it is advisable to revise and rationalise the
same realistically and judiciously.
Even though caste-based reservation is
an anachronism today, but it is part of our social reality and is likely to
continue till we can actually claim to have guaranteed the underprivileged and marginalised sections of our society and
bare minimum of civic facilities and necessities including quality education
and health services. A system of equal opportunities coupled with a reasonably
egalitarian and equitable society is what is required before we can hope to
hammer the last nail in the coffin of the politics of caste-based reservation.
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