Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Reservation about Reservations

In an interesting debate with my Father about reservations we came to the following conclusions

1. Reservations for SC/ST should be present in all forms of education, but mechanisms to prevent the creamy layer should be implemented
2. The MOBCs should be identified (Most Backward classes) and reservation should be extended to them in all forms of education
3. Reservations should not encouraged in employment, but there should be affirmative action
4. Affirmative action should be extended to economic backward class irrespective of caste. Reservation will not work here as it is not easy to define "economic backwardness"
5. Unfilled seats via reservation should be given back to General merit. But this requires a proper implementation.

But for all of the above to work in a +ve manner there should be AWARENESS created about education and its benefits in these people. Another way is to lure ppl towards education.

Mid-day meal is an excellent program which is working towards educating the masses.
People are sending their kids so that atleast these ppl get access to one proper meal per day. In the process the kids picks-up a little of formal GYAN.

There should be more scholarships at higher education level, so that the backward class people complete their education and make a living out of it. THE CREAMY layer should be punished if they even try for reservation.

Reasons for the above

A large population of SC/ST/MOBCs do not have access to education. Their economic state is very bad. They are mostly worried about making a living for the day. In that most of them tend to ignore the benefits of education.
Most of them are still under bonded labour, more of it in the Northern states and the backward villages.

Sample Data
My Village. The incidents my dad gave were shocking.

After the discussion, my reservations about reservation has gone down.
I realised that I hate the concept of reservation due to its bad implementatioin.

I feel its better a mediocre backward (economically) student gets a living for himself and his family by studying in a reserved seat rather than a well-to-do meritorious guy who will flee to US of A.

In general I conclude Reservation with proper implementation is a must for the all-round development of the society.
The current move by the govt is absurd, as 90% of the listed OBC's have very well-to-do people and this should not happen.
The MOBCs should be identified and reservation should be extended to them, may be a max of 7.5%.
Affirmative action in employing these ppl should also be implemented.

More number of seats should be added so that Merit students arent deprived. We need to check Brain Drain and reservations should not become a pretext for people to flee.

3 comments:

Sridhar Raman said...

Well said!

Avi said...

Revervations was a good idea when introduced. Corruption in the govenment, favoritism screwed the implementation of this. You are right, ppl are not against the reservation as such. People dont like it because they are sure of the way it is going to be implemented. The reservations are never going to reach the needy, instead the opportunistic politicians will use it to their benefit.

sudeep said...

fully agreed.
Well said.

Maybe, reservation must be done in two levels :-

a)Have reservations for MOBCs in all forms of education.

b)A quota should be there economically backward classes, regardless of caste.

But still impact may be bad for some guys. It really hurts when a guy who just misses a medical/engineering/law seat than a jerk who takes this imbalance to the full advantage.