Votes, Notes, Minister-Posts & Reservation

Reservations for the OBCs, STs, SCs, Women, Religious minorities, and so on and so forth. There are no limits to it. And add to that the arenas in which these can be asked for – Primary education, Higher education, Govt Jobs, Private jobs…and so on. This policy of reservation can turn into a menace if it’s not being understood and implemented correctly.

So before we go all guns firing about the usefulness of this R-word, let’s first see whether we understand it. So what is reservation? A discount being given to a few castes and gender where government of this country feel that they have lagged behind because of socially unequal face of globalizing India. But why based on the origins of a person does he get reservation? Why not a major caste person living under poverty line in deplorable conditions gets the same right of reservation? He is equally downtrodden and unable to generate funds to equal the ‘background’ of the ‘qualified’ ones?

The answer is one word – POLITICS. Reservations, the kind of based on caste/creed/gender are the necessary catalyst for vote-bank politics. It’s rather a sad fact, that the sentiments generated on the basis of such ingredients are so huge that people can kill each other, leave the votes aside. And Politicians are the smartest creatures on this earth to master this art of raging such sentiments again and again for ‘Kursi’. If they are really interested in upliftment of people and providing equal opportunities, let’s classify people as HAVE and HAVE-NOTS and then take steps about the equalization, which we will talk about later cannot be achieved by Reservations. So it’s ultimately, ‘its all about money, honey’.

As pointed out in a brilliant analysis by a former IIM student that even reservation candidates will lose if it is being applied without thinking as the govt is hell-bent on. What I want to say is, if not reservation then what is the answer –

PRIMARY EDUCATION – This is where the focus should be. Why doesn’t the govt think of putting reservation regime in primary education? (It doesn’t give them votes…but why? It’s the IIMs which are hogging the limelight for mammoth salaries, not the primary schools J and it directly relates to the mind of the voters J got it..the same ‘mind space funda’). People should be divided amongst HAVEs and HAVE-NOTs and half the problem will be solved. Not Muslim, not SC/ST/OBC…we had enough for last 56 years, it only created more separation than cohesion. Thereafter, each school private or public should be forced to give admission to HAVE-NOTs for at least 30-40% of the seats.

SOFT-SKILL ENABLING – In most of the cases that I have seen, it’s on the soft skills front that most of the people from deprived sections (as they say) lag. In order to tackle this, centers should be opened which will be state-funded and have quality grooming for only such candidates. IIM-K’ s Centre for excellence projects is a case in point where they taught graduates from only such sections and the results are inspiring. Now, such centers will give them a serious chance of competing in all such higher studies competitions and get into IITs and IIMs. Here is that story

FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE – I am sure that there are large number of deserving candidates from the ‘labeled castes’ and can achieve their dreams by joining premier institutions on merit with financial assistance from the Govt and scholarships from corporate world. “Believe you me”, a seat won on credentials is more satisfying than the one being given as a token of backwardness.

REALLY LATE – When a person is given reservations in higher education, and not when his foundation was laid in the primary standards, it’s too late. It’s not very easy to perform in IITs and IIMs against the so called – ‘qualified general’ class when cut-throat competition is pervading corporate India. And when comes the word PLACEMENTS, the ship is lost. Until and unless you have been trained at the lowest level and your foundation is in correct place, just getting into the playing eleven doesn’t mean that you will win the game. And to add one more analogy, in the world where teams are piling up 400+ scores and losing it out, how can you expect to win if you don’t fire your guns in the first fifteen. Same goes here!


So, If our politicians can think ahead of votes…they can get much better solutions to solve this problem rather than the Reservation. But the problem is…..WHO wants to solve the problem? Its all about votes, notes and minister-posts!!

~ Nitin