The reservation jumla

Mains Paper 4: Polity
Prelims level: Reservation system
Mains level: Indian Constitution- historical underpinnings, evolution, features, amendments, significant
provisions and basic structure

Context

•  The announcement of 10 per cent reservation for economically backward groups in the upper castes is another example of the travesty that characterises constitutional and political discourse when it comes to reservations.
•  This proposal has one element of honesty in it.
•  It admits this government’s massive failure on every front. The stark reality is this. The Indian economy is not generating enough attractive jobs; nor is our education system training graduates properly enough to participate in the economy.
•  In the context of that failure, there has been a clamour amongst the educated upper caste groups like Rajputs for a reservation route to be opened up for them.
•  Since we cannot create enough jobs, the token signal that the poor from the upper castes can be symbolically represented in the state is all that we can now offer.

Background of the Indian reservations system

•  India needs effective forms of reservation or affirmative action, especially for Dalits.
•  But our reservation policy, post Mandal, has more generally become a prime example of majoritarian politics, where the exigencies of politics and power rather than the ethical and moral claims drive entitlements.
•  One of the biggest casualties of this move has been that the historical specificity of the experience of Dalits has been completely occluded.
•  Every other group has managed to don the mantle of victimhood in the same way.
•  The purpose of reservation has been stretched beyond combating discrimination and empowering the truly marginalised, (that is the only thing it does not do), to now an anti-poverty measure, a load it cannot bear.
•  The idea that you can address economic deprivation through reservation is preposterous.

Constitutional validity

•  If we have decided to introduce a constitutional amendment to expand the scope of reservations, what will happen to the OBC demand that has been articulated for a long time, that the 50 per cent ceiling should be breached to accommodate OBCs in proportion to their numbers?
•  Why is the government, the argument goes, not releasing full caste data?
•  There is an inherent escalating logic to this. If we are talking representativeness as such, which other groups should be included in its ambit?
•  Should Muslims, the one group whose mobility is now lagging even more than SCs, come in via their sub castes or as a category in their own right? What about gender as a more potent axis of deprivation?
•  VP Singh could not control Mandal, and this government should not assume it can ride this cynical ploy.

Way forward

•  There will, of course, be other constitutional questions.
•  Will a breaching of the 50 per cent ceiling, or the inclusion of groups that are economically, but not socially backward, pass constitutional muster? If precedent is any guide, it should not. One way or the other, this issue is going to deepen the crisis of the judiciary.
•  If it caves in, it will be seen as pliant, overturning a hard-won constitutional settlement it had itself created.
•  If it does not, the clamour will be to portray the Indian judiciary as an obstacle to greater social justice (which, in the case of reservation jurisprudence, will be unjustified).
•  These matters cannot be discussed in conventional categories, because the Supreme Court itself has become so arbitrary.
•  So the government is taking a bet that all conventional legal precedent can go for toss and it can get its way.
•  That is how cynical politics has become.
   

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General Studies Pre. Cum Mains Study Materials

Prelims Questions:

Q.1) Consider following statements about Dr. B. R. Ambedkar:
1. He was in favour of separate electorate for the Depressed Classes.
2. He signed Poona Pact with Gandhiji to assert his demand of separate electorate for the Depressed Classes.
3. He strongly opposed partition of Indiaalong religious lines.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 1 and 3 only
(b) 1 only
(c) 2 and 3 only
(d) 1, 2 and 3

Answer: B

Mains Questions:
Q.1) It will be fascinating to see if any political party has the guts to speak the truth. Or will this be an all-party jumla?