Reservation is a curse on Indian society. Reservation policy should be immediately replaced with a policy on empowerment through investment in education. Now let me deal with it in detail.
The Indian society is moving backwards. Demand for reservations in privates sector is becoming more louder. Social Justice Minister Meira Kumar says that reservation is not a dole but a corrective action. Her observation is guided by a mental thought process which was and is responsible for introducing reservation and then continuing it for indefinite period so that it can be used as a vote-bank tool.
The minister is wrong on both counts. Reservation might not be a dole at the time it was introduced, but with coupling it to vote-bank politics it has become a dole. Benefit given in any form for compensating a deficiency becomes a dole if given to extract favour, in this case votes. Meira Kumar has also talked that private sector industries had always enjoyed benefits and concessions from the government, and now is the time that these favours are returned. Still she says that reservation is not a dole.
Corrective action is needed to correct a problem to prevent its re-occurrence. If reservation was introduced to correct a problem then how the problem is still there even after more than five decades? Asking for reservation in private sector is in turn admitting that problem has not been contained but has become much bigger. In such case this corrective action (reservation policy) was either not correct or not implemented in a correct manner. It is time to think positive. The reservation policy should be scrapped and other alternative corrective actions should be determined.
One such approach could be empowerment of downtrodden through investment in education. The Prime Minister has himself spoken about it. With 2% cess for education will provide necessary finances. The government should rise above the vote bank politics and initiate scrapping of the negative reservation policy.
The International Commission on Education has said that the aim of education is to transform a person into a complete man so that such an educated person could form the building block of a prosperous society and peaceful world. If some people are given relaxation in education norms then how they can be expected to become solid building blocks as their interior will be hollow. And if they are forcibly put there under reservation policy then the entire structure will come tumbling down.
There are many ministers and leaders in congress who are industrialists and can provide employment to many SC/ST people. Why Meira Kumar is not asking them to provide reservation in their companies? Charity begins at home. Let congress create examples for other private sector players. Similar is the case with non-congress champions of reservation.
India is a free country. It should also be a classless society. But how a society can become classless if every now and then more classes are added in the name of reservation. Earlier upper castes were criticized for their stand that a person should be known by his birth and not karma. With changing times, upper castes have changed their stand and now they treat people by their karma and not by birth. People are taking employment or business as per their competence and not as per their traditional family business. I have seen Brahmins working in shoe factories.
Agrawals are running hair-cutting saloons. Things have changed. Caste and caste biases, discriminations and prejudices based on racial considerations like colour, language, religion and race have become things of the past. Whatever discrimination is still being practiced is by these champions of reservation. SC/ST or other so-called dalits have not changed. Rather they now take pride in associating themselves with their birth irrespective of the work they are engaged in. Perhaps India will be the only country where a dalit remains dalit even after becoming the President of the country.
Then these champions of reservation speak of social equilibrium? Is it a mere balance of numbers in schools, colleges, jobs, and legislatures, or some competence is also involved? And balance of numbers between whom ? deserving and non-deserving? Is it going to be achieved by forcing non-deserving in slots where only deserving should be allowed? Is this social equilibrium will be achieved by sacrificing business performance and productivity?
Champions of reservation always cry that not many SC/ST people are employed in the Private Sector and their representation in this sector is negligible. What relation employment has with representation? Jobs are created to perform a specific function. The person employed for a job should be competent to discharge that function. How can a job be reserved for some unknown body who most likely will not meet competence criteria for that job?
Now let us discuss reservation as a concept and what has been achieved by this policy in last more than five decades. Reservation by nature is discrimination. It discriminates between merit and reservation-based non-merit. The concept has been based and practiced on hate for those who were considered responsible for in-human existence of a section of Indian society. Hate for hate has been the principle behind reservation ? they took away our life from us so now we will take away their life from them.
This poison of hatred has been forced in the psyche of these people by those who discovered reservation as a very convenient tool to fulfill their political ambitions. They have no love for these people. They only treat them as a tool. But the poison has gone so deep in the mind that the beneficiaries of reservation have become a liability on the society and national resources. Reservation has killed their self-respect. They have lost their self-esteem. They suffer with a deep inferiority complex. Otherwise how a person will think that God has made him less intelligent than his classmate of upper caste. Is he lacking resources or intelligence also?
Then how the problem should have been handled. Empowerment through investment in education was the right approach. Develop these people to such an extent that they can compete with every body else. Once they are developed then there will be no need of reservation. Now for development they should be provided a level field. For this all required resources should be provided. Such resources have been provided but with reservation in the store, the beneficiaries have not worked hard as competence criteria for them have been diluted to a large extent. It is but natural that a person will not work hard if he knows that he has to only appear in the exam. Whatever be his performance he will pass and get a job, already reserved for him. It is here reservation becomes a dole.
Empowerment should not be linked with caste. Resources should be provided to all those who need them and should be limited to one-time for every person in a family. This can be easily achieved by declaring children as national resource. It should be the responsibility of parents, then society and lastly the government to develop this national resource. Harming this resource in any manner should be considered a national crime. This should also be subject to two-child norm per parent.
The concept of reservation should be abolished. There should be no reservation in any segment of Indian society including education, jobs, facilities and legislature. All should be treated equal. There should be no VIP or VVIP. A Prime Minister and his peon should be treated as equal. After all both are doing their job and the one who is doing his job better should be appreciated. Only then India will become a classless s