The reservation debate seems to be progressing with vigour even though the government forced the YFE forum to back down at AIIMS. Today Ms. Meira Kumar took the issue one step further with increasing the reservation for SC’s now!! This is in addition to the pledge the UPA government has taken to introduce the same in respect of jobs in the private sector. It is a wonder how far the government will with so called upliftment policy of theirs.
Years ago, when the Indian Constitution was being drafted, the Constituent Assembly debated this issue. They felt it was imperative to take some step to bring the weaker sections of society to the fore after so many centuries of discrimination. Very noble of them and very prudent. At that juncture, certain senior and highly respected political figures, viz. Mahatma Gandhi, Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru and Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, proposed introducing quotas in certain fields for these communities.
Just a few years later, in a letter to his cabinet, Pt. Nehru admitted that quotas were not the solution to the problem they wanted to eliminate. He admitted the blunder they had committed when they drafted the Constitution.
Over six decades later we are talking of extending the quota system to the private sector. The world has changed a lot in the last few decades but unfortunately the very honourable octogenarians in New Delhi seem to be oblivious to this. Today, the world runs on purchasing power and the ability to stand one’s ground in the midst of the mad scramble for more greenbacks. It is a world where bills of currency decide who is entitled to what. Gone are the days when admission to a club or restaurant or a train coach was based on the colour of one’s skin or caste or religion. You can have whatever you want if you can pay for it. Unfortunately, this also applies to education, that vast ocean of knowledge which grows the more people it is given to. Ask the parents of a 4 year old in any urban city how much they have shell out to ensure their tiny tot can access a decent education. This same logic passes all through the education chain right up to the post graduate education level.
Then why, is it that the government wants to reserve seats only at the end of the chain? If the noble logic behind the gesture of quotas is to ensure access to education for the downtrodden, then pray, why don’t you do the same at the primary level? After all, isn’t a 4 year from a backward caste also entitled to education…or do they become ‘eligible’, by some weird train of thought, only when they come of age?
1 comment:
Isn't the answer pretty obvious? :)
Would the honourable octogenarians get any votes by providing education at the primary level?
By doing this, however, all the social problems would be eliminated - and the contentious topic of the need for reservations in higher education would be nullified. But that won't rake in the points on ballot day will it?
And it's been 6 decades, like you said. If reservations haven't worked under the *visionary leadership* of Nehru, Indira et al, what is the possibility that it will work now, in the political turmoil in which one honest man is trying to hold together a jigsaw of factions fighting with each other?
Hmm... There are certain plus points to converting India to a monarchy [:P]
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