The quota row might hit the country again following the judgment given by the honourable Supreme Court today. With this verdict, the court’s interim order of March 29, 2007, staying the implementation of the quota has now been lifted.
The highlights of the verdict are:
· Supreme Court upholds 27 per cent Other Backward Caste (OBC) quota in educational institutions
· No to creamy layer in 27 per cent OBC quota
· Reservations in educational institutions now 49.5 per cent
· No decision on OBC quota in private colleges
· No harm in implementing OBC quota this year
· Review of OBC quota list every five years
· Children of former, current MPs and MLAs to be excluded from quota
Youth for Equality, petitioners who challenged the move of the government to introduce OBC Quota are not really ecstatic with the verdict, but they are not disappointed as well. The reason being that many things that have been challenged need to be vindicated in the verdict. Most of you must not be aware, what happened exactly in the case and what arguments were put up by the government and the petitioners. The petitioners forwarded the following arguments.
1. The 2006 quota law was unconstitutional as the government went ahead with reservation for OBCs without identifying the intended beneficiaries.
2. Non-exclusion of creamy layer from the purview of OBC quota law violated Supreme Court’s verdicts on the issue and went in favour of the well off among the OBCs.
3. Caste cannot be the sole basis for identifying the socially and educationally backwards for the purpose of reservation as it ran contrary to the constitutional objective of achieving an egalitarian society.
4. Reservation cannot be for an unlimited period.
The verdict has clearly mentioned the exclusion of creamy layer from the ambit of the reservation. This is remarkable because the government was never ever ready to exclude them. I guess the reservations were mainly intended for them otherwise, the government could have given up on this demand themselves. This exclusion of the creamy layer was so because the well off among the backward classes become like the upper class people and avail of the benefits of the reservation, much to the disadvantage of the most backward segment of the OBC, which actually deserves the fruits of reservation policy.
However, now there is a problem as to who will decide what constitutes the creamy layer. It would not be a good thing if the government is given this power because the government will then do all it can to subvert the SC verdict. In Maharashtra, the limit for creamy layer is an annual salary of four lakh rupees per annum (which is considerable because before the pay commission report, this was not the annual salary of high rank IAS and government officials). The other good thing is that the children of former and current MPs and MLAs have been excluded as well. This decision makes sense because if you have all facilities, which are entitled to a MLA or MP, then there is no need for the reservations.
The verdict of the Supreme Court is very good and Youth for Equality will see that all the recommendations of the apex body are met. Yet, the battle is still far from being over. The petitioners also say that the revision of OBC quota should not be done by the government, but an independent body if we really want to get rid of this reservation eventually.
The arguments forwarded by the government in the process of the verdict were:
1. The OBC quota law as being completely in tune with the constitutional requirements.
2. Caste is a reality of the Indian society and it should, like in the case of reservation in public employment, form the sole basis for the identification of backwardness among the OBCs.
3. There cannot be any time limit for reservation.
4. The government also defended the inclusion of creamy layer in the OBC quota law, but said it was for the court to take a final view on it.
There are a few points that appear so brazen in the arguments forwarded by the government. The government said that the caste is a reality of Indian society. Agreed. We have so many instances where people of one caste have been targeted by another. But, then if the government says that this is the reality, it only shows the helplessness of the government and its failure in these 60 years to not have been able to change the scenario. So, who is to be blamed? The caste has become indispensable part of India‘s politics and there are a few states in the country, where caste determines everything in an election, plays a huge role in general elections. The politicians are to be blamed the most who just do not want the word “caste” be eradicated from our country. Every assessment, which they make of national problems, and the policies that are formed are based on one factor and that is caste. The result of this is perpetuation of caste system rather than its eradication. The reservations are not the long-term solution.
The government also said that there could be no time frame for the reservations. Isn’t this argument senseless? If you implement a policy anywhere, the first thing you see is– whether it will be a success. If the government believes that its policy is not a successful one, then why not choose for another policy? I just wonder why can’t we have some affirmative actions based on caste free economic criteria? There can be just so many ways to bring the social equality and at the same time eradicating caste.
Let me tell you that ‘reservations’ was just one of the many recommendations given by the Mandal Commission. But our politicians have put the other recommendations in the dustbin and went ahead with the reservations as it provides them a ready made curry of “vote banks”. A communal and caste based feeling and emotion can be easily aroused and we see the same thing happening before every elections held in India. The reservation system is being misused to create a privileged ruling elite, instead of creating an equal society. It is obvious that we cannot eradicate caste under the garb of caste reservation. The political mind of India has been ‘mandalised’ beyond redemption and the ghosts of Mandal will return to create further divisions in our caste-ridden society.
Arjun Singh says, “He has been vindicated” but the point from where I see that this has just started a rearward trend. The protests in the early April 2006 and there onwards some what divided our college campus and there was an awkward feeling in every one’s mind. If the government continues to play such petty politics then it will leave a scar on the face of India. The youth, which is the strength of our nation, is made to believe that in our country caste is the most determinative parameter for everything. The youth is craving for an egalitarian society and such incidents hamper the spirit of the youth as well. Youth is the symbol of dynamism, growth and development and if the older generation cannot change their mindset, then it our responsibility to change it. Our political values have plunged so low that it we need courage to do something right. The verdict will have some reactions and counter-reactions and we may see fresh grind in our country, which will be very unfortunate. Already, there are so many instances of caste and class wars and it would have been better if we could have absolved the young population.
It is high time for youth to come together and teach the government a lesson. The best way would be to come out and vote in all the upcoming elections because the ‘votes’ are the only thing our political parties care for. Nani Palkhiwala once said that the way class wars and caste wars are going on in India, we would see another divided India. Don’t we ever want to learn? It is time to stand up and get ourselves involved in the democratic process of India.
Rishabh Srivastava
[Image courtesy: http://www.flickr.com/photos/parijat/150929124/in/set-72057594141686974/]
There has been a final adjudication of the dispute with regard to OBC reservation. From The perspective of Youth For Equality we would like to bring out the following Points.
1. Economically and Socially backward classes of people must be included in the list of beneficiaries which a path breaking achievements for us.
2. We have succeeded in our endeavor of getting the creamy layer excluded
3. Educational Backwardness cannot be claimed beyond graduation
4. Periodic review of beneficiaries every five years which would imply that the Govt must collect periodic data.
5. Till today there is no list of beneficiaries. If the Govt tries to bring in undeserving groups in the list of beneficiaries who are not socially and economically backward the list shall be open to challenge.
6. The list that the Govt may bring has to be that of socially and Educationally backward classes plus socially and Economically backward classes. If the Govt brings in a list of OBCs under the scheme of article 15, our understanding is that it shall fail the test of judicial review. As such the judgment clearly points out that such a notification of list shall be open to judicial review.
The fight to get the Economically and Socially backward classes included in the list of beneficiaries and also to Oppose caste based reservation shall continue as their shall be a periodic revision of the beneficiaries every 5 years and create an equal opportunity society for all
Jai Hind
Indian democratic politics has, however, used the Mandal labels in a very different way. It has encouraged more and more groups to get into a race of being More OBC than Thou. No political party has any incentive in arguing that jati status is not a foolproof indicator of social and economic backwardness. There are, as Mayawati has discovered, poor Brahmins and rich OBCs. This is because economic development over the last hundred years has allowed opportunities for some individuals in ritually backward jatis and indeed for some jatis themselves to move up the social and economic ladder.
Mandal and democratic compulsions invite us to abandon this path. No matter how prosperous a backward jati will become, it will keep the label and it will be in the interest of every jati to hang on to the backward label since it is a passport to public favours. The recent agitation by Gujjars has shown that the stakes for being labelled as backward are very high, and in a democratic culture there will be competitive populism to accord such status to whoever promises the vote bank to a party.
But the die is now cast. Parliament legislated reservations and now the Supreme Court has validated the legislation. There are caveats about the creamy layer but I predict that Lok Sabha will not be in a hurry to implement the Supreme Court’s injunctions about extending the definition of creamy layer to themselves and ex-MPs. I wish that were a precondition before reservations could be implemented.
My hope is that the decision will achieve the good it wishes to. My expectation is that it will not. This is because the real problem of social deprivation for the SCs, STs, OBCs is in primary schools and secondary schools where the foundations of failure are laid and no political party, whatever its rhetoric, is grasping that nettle. Every one is for reserving seats at the top of the pyramid and joining the creamy layer of IITs and IIMs. But between the top layer of rich upper castes and the creamy layers of the beneficiaries of reservations, there is a large slice of India. They cannot escape Indian higher education by going abroad as the rich can, nor can they get into the top institutions by merit. As of now no political party wishes to champion them but they constitute a fertile ground of the disaffected whose bitterness will be harvested by some party sooner or later.
From Indian Express: http://www.indianexpress.com/printerFriendly/297276.html
Tamil Nadu is often used as a legitimising model by OBC activists. What we need to keep in mind is that as far back as the 1930s Travancore state had a literacy rate that Bihar struggles to attain even today. The Tamil Nadu model becomes more farcical when we notice that the line that separates OBC students from non-OBC ones is neither firm nor deep.
For instance, as Shiv Chaudhary has shown, in Tamil Nadu’s 2005 MBBS entrance tests, the difference in the cut-off marks between the general and the reserved categories was as low as 0.08 per cent. Naturally, with such a negligible percentage variation, the OBCs crowd the general category over and above occupying those seats that are reserved for them. Consequently, the rest of the non-OBC population is seriously unrepresented in these colleges.
This graphically demonstrates that Tamil Nadu OBCs have always had an entrenched elite stratum. OBC leaders among Gounders, Vanniyars, Thevars and Marawas were, and continue to be, powerful on every social axis. Therefore, when their educational profile is as good as, if not better than, the general category, it obviously means that they never did, and do not now, deserve reservations. True, these so-called backwards are not Brahmins, but if they can kick the priests in the teeth what good is it to have a mouthful of Sanskrit?
The Tamil Nadu backwards played on the textbook image of the rapacious Brahmin though in every province, with the slight exception of Thanjavur, the once-priestly class enjoys no dominance. Power was always in the hands of OBC elite who did well in the past and continue to do well even today. If one is to believe human development figures then the status of Tamil Nadu Dalits has remained unchanged over all these years of OBC rule.
TOI: Dated: 15/04/08