Caste based reservations. Review on Education as Business

India and China are similar in several aspects. The Asian giants together house 1/6th of the world's population. They both share cultural values, which date back to the pre-Christ era. Both are nuclear powers and both of them used to be developing countries (China isn't anymore and India still is). It is these striking similarities, which make people, compare India with China and to try reasoning out as to why China is doing much better than India.

There could be a myriad of reasons for this but the ones that are the most important are the political system in the two countries and the quality of education. The political aspect is often debated upon and I wouldn't want to delve into that.

Let me not compare India with China for a while. Let us just look at our education system as it is without any prejudiced notions. Education in India has for long been the bête noire of politicians. And why is it so? It is because these people bring in a system called reservation on basis of caste and creed? to further their own political ambitions.

Has this system helped India? Well maybe it did but it certainly hasn?t had any visible impact. Would it have a positive impact in the future is a question that is considered impiously irreverent. The effect is yet to be seen and hence people end up questioning the system.

The policy of reservation in educational institutions and government jobs for the socially and economically backward people was brought into effect to make these people a part of the current system and so that they have a better say in the functioning of the government.

These people have been treated as neglects for a long time and weren?t even a part of the hierarchical and hereditary system of the Varnashrama dharma. They were subjected to inhumane conditions by the so called upper caste people (Brahmins mostly) and hence this is the only way we can get them back on track. I totally agree and this is the only way we can set right the grievous wrong doings of our forefathers.

Why then am I against this system now? The answer to that question lies in realizing that the system is currently being misused and hence won?t serve the purpose it was intended to. The reservation policy has been in existence since 1991 after the Mandal Commission submitted its report to the then VP Singh government highlighting the necessity of caste based reservation system.

It was originally decided that the system would be in place for 10 years from the date it was implemented on. If that were true then this system shouldn?t be in existence today but that is not so. Infact the reservation quota has been increased further.

The Mandal Commission decided in favor of reservation system because they thought it would help in eradicating the deplorable condition of the illiterate masses and thus help in creating a generation, which would be educated and as a result politically, socially and economically aware of the happenings around them. This would be advantageous because if the current generation were educated then the generation following them would be educated.

This system as I had mentioned before has been in existence for 15 years now. Isn?t 15 years long enough to create a generation that would be able to fend for themselves and which would be able to realize the importance of imparting education to the generations following them. Wouldn?t this generation have the means to do so? Why then should the reservation be in place? If it is to support all those financially deprived people, hasn?t enough been done already? There are people who are not financially sound even amongst the forward caste people? What has been done by the government to improve their conditions? Is it ok if other people enjoy the benefits they are currently enjoying at the cost of these people?s rights?

What the current government is doing, is the implementation of Varnashrama Dharma again wherein the hunted become the hunter. All this for something that their forefathers did. There are students amongst the backward caste as well who have the means to study but they still don?t and thus take undue advantage of the reservation system. And there are students amongst those who apply through the general quota i.e. open category who don?t get what is due to them.

Civil engineers constructing faulty buildings and doctors killing their own patients are glaring examples of what would happen if this system were to continue.

I am not asking the government to scrap the reservation system completely. Instead of making it a caste based reservation quota, which hasn?t had a positive effect let us change it to something that would assist poor students irrespective of their caste, creed or religion. That would be a viable solution taking the current situation in view.

Recently the Rajasthan government tried to extend the reservation quota to the financially deprived students amongst the forward caste people but there was a hue and cry over that and it was scrapped. This policy looks more like prevent the forward caste people from developing even if the backward caste people don?t develop. But the same government had no problem with the increase in reservation quota for the Muslims in Andhra Pradesh.

As long as these double standards are prevalent, I don?t see India going ahead of China in the near future. Reservations on the basis of caste, have affected administrative efficiency and the quality of governance in the country. Economic backwardness should alone be the criterion for reservation. But this should be confined to providing educational facilities only to the really deserving ones.

The government has been extending the reservation policy not because it is concerned about these people but because it wants to use these people as a vote bank. It would do this country a lot good if all those rich people, amongst the groups that have been covered by the reservation policy, come forward and compete with the other people in the general category.