Reservations : The Bane Of Indian Society

For my second post I thought of writing about something that we all have an opinion about and that is reservations in educational institutions. Before writing about what I feel about this topic I will give you a brief overview on why reservations were introduced. As you all know our Indian caste system was divided into four groups the Brahmins( priests, scholars), Kshatriyas(warriors & kings), Vaishyas( agriculturists & traders) and the Shudras(service providers & artisans). These divisions were made at that time so as to clearly demarcate the roles of each person living in society and for the proper functioning.

But gradually this caste system started to erode the people. The Brahmins kept the knowledge to themselves and denied others the right to study the scriptures. The lower sections of the society were outcast and denied the right of proper living. But you know the beauty of our Indian culture is such that it adapts itself according to the changing times and adopts the good and throws away the bad practices which were followed in the past. We have many such examples. Practices like sati, untouchability, child marriage have been abolished.

So with the prevalent caste system many reformers like Mahatma Phule, Raja Ram Mohan Roy took upon themselves to bring about a change.

When India won Independence in 1947 Dr Ambedkar was given the charge of drafting the constitution. He was of the firm belief that since the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes were oppressed for long they should be given reservations in educational institutions and jobs so they also get a chance to uplift themselves. He allocated 15% and 7.5% reservations for SC and ST respectively. But the important thing here is he also mentioned in the constitution that this was for a temporary period and it needs to be reviewed after a period of 10 years.

I feel Dr Ambedkar was right at that time to include reservations for the SC's and ST's as they should also get a right to education. This set of reservation rules was followed till 1978. Then in 1979 a new commision called the Mandal commision was set up to review the situation of the backward classes. They decided to include the Other Backward Classes(OBC's) also under the reservation umbrella and give them 27% which increased the reservation quota to 49.5%. These recommendations were implemented by VP Singh in 1990 which led to widespread revolts all over the country by student bodies.

With the passage of time reservation has been used as a tactic by the Cong govt for votebank politics. I cant believe even after 60 years of our Independence reservations still exist and is continuing to thrive. The purpose of introducing reservations was to uplift the lower sections of society and then gradually it should have been phased out as more and more people used it.

But no the Govt saw this as an opportunity to generate vote banks by giving more and more reservations. Even the IIT's and IIM's have not been spared. These are the premier educational institutions in our country and the effects of such reservations are for all of us o see. Do you know the cutoff for getting into IIT for a student from SC caste is nearly half of a student from Open Category!!! Can you believe that?? I also came to know of an astonishing fact that many students who enter the IIT's with low cutoffs after a peroid of 1-2 years drop out as they cannot cope up with the studies. Now due to these dropouts those seats are wasted and deserving students are denied the chance.

I feel that reservations should be based on the economic conditions of a person and not on his caste. I have seen so many instances where people who flaunt their caste certificates are very rich so where does the question of upliftment come here. The creamy layer states that any person whose annual family income is above 2.5 lacs should be excluded from the reservation status. Also children of doctors, engineers, media professionals, etc are also excluded. But in our country there is a way of getting around anything. People produce fake creamy layer certificates inorder to avail the reservation facility. Now instead of basing it on caste if the reservations are based on economic conditions then it is more logical.

For example there is a student who is brilliant in studies but cannot continue his higher studies as he doesnt have the money then in such cases he should be provided all the help to fulfil his dreams. If we want the best IAS officers, best policemen, best engineers and best doctors then merit only should be the sole criteria. Otherwise we are letting mediocrity to set in and things to worsen.

I myself have many times felt frustrated by this reservation system during my college days when I see people with lower marks than me getting better colleges than me.I have nothing against the people who make use of their caste certificates to get admissions to colleges. They are just using the system to suit their ways.The change need to be brought about in the system. The time has come to review and adapt the reservation system according to the need of the times. If we want to become a progressive and developed country we have to promote merit and merit only.

Before I end my post I ask you this one question

How can we force the govt to review and reform the reservation policies?
Although I am not much familiar about it with the introduction of RTI we have an opportunity to voice our concerns and demand an explanation from the authorities.

Wishing you all a Happy Independence Day in advance I end my post.Please write in your comments and feedback.

My First Post

So here I am writing my first post on my blog. You know people we all have studied history in our school days, but have u ever thought that what we have studied in the books are they a true representation of the facts? For example we all have studied about Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. To me Bose was a gr8 leader and a patriot in the true sense. He was one of the few leaders who fought for the freedom cause by awakening the Indians who lived abroad. The formation of the INA, his umpteen disguises to escape the British all these are widely known facts. But his death is still a mystery even after more than 60 years. The publicised fact is that he died in a plane crash in Taiwan while he was on his way to Japan. But I am sure you might have heard or read about sightings of Bose even after his death. So as I was searching on the Internet to find out more about this I came to know of many startling facts. Firstly as per reports the air crash was used as a decoy so that Subhashji could escape to USSR. What adds more credibility to this is that the British India refused to confirm the death of Bose even in Oct 1946 ie more than a year after his death.

At the time of the Second World War the Allied forces were fighing the three pronged forces of Japan, Italy and Germany. Bose took advantage of this opportunity as he knew that this is the right time to press for India's freedom more as Britain will be concentrating more on the War. He began talks with Nazi Germany and Japanese forces and shook hands with them. Now some people may argue on him supporting the Germans but as Bose once famously said that he is ready to shake hands with the Devil for the cause of India's freedom. So in 1945 when Germany was defeated Bose turned to Japan but the two nuclear blasts in Hiroshima and Nagasaki really weakened Japan. Bose knew that so he decided to take help from USSR. The Allied forces were closely following him so he had to one step ahead of them. There are confirmed reports of him escaping to USSR and his trusted aide Colonel Habibur Rehman Khan had also said to the govt appointed committee that he is sworn to secrecy.

However after reading so much the one thing I dont understand is why the Govt of India don't make the facts surrounding his death to the public. The first appointed commision to probe Bose's death was the Shah Nawaz committee. They didnt seek assistance from the Taiwenese govt citing reasons that India doesnt have diplomatic relations with Taiwan. The second commitee appointed was the Khosla committee which also confirmed the publicised fact of his death in Taiwan. In 1999 the Mukherjee commission was formed. This commission went through all the documents and even visited Japan, Russia and Taiwan. This commissions findings overturned the previous two committee's findings and came to the conclusion that Bose's death in Taiwan was a cover-up for his escape to USSR. The commission submitted their report to the Home minister which was then put forth in Parliament but the Indian govt rejected the findings of the commission. All these clearly point that the Govt is trying to cover up but in doing so it is keeping the public in dark. Even classified documents after a period of time become declassified. In a recent RTI act filed by a non profit organisation called Mission Netaji to clear all the documents that it is holding related to Netaji's death the Govt of India rejected their application citing that if they make these documents public then it would spoil the diplomaic ties with foreign countries.

I know that my post is getting longer but before I end it I ask you few questions

1.> Dont we the citizens of this country have the right to know the actual facts?

2.> In 1954 Dr S RadhaKrishnan the then President of India had told his trusted aide S.M Goswami that he had met Bose in Moscow in 1948 at a conference and Bose had expressed his desire of returning back to India. This was told by Mr Goswami to the Inquiry Commission set up by the Govt. Why did the Govt then take no action in researching on this piece of info especially when it was voiced by one of our formed Presidents.

Another interesting piece of info that I came up with was about a sage living in Faizabad in UP who was known by his followers as Gumnaami Baba. This sage died in 1985. According to many people this Baba was Subhash Chandra Bose. The interesting thing here is this saint Gumnaami Baba or Bhagwanji as he was called looked like Bose, sounded like him was of the same height and also had similar reading habits and common friends like Bose. After his death a team conducted its investigation and searched the place where the Baba used to live. They found rare documents and photographs of Bose. The followers of this sage celebrated his birthday on Jan 23rd the same day as Bose.

So was Gumnaami Baba actually Bose in exile??? I leave this question for you to ponder upon.:):)

I would love to hear your suggestions and comments on my post.