Reservations detoxified

The malign leg sprouted -

. between the ball and the opponent's kicking leg, the referee whistled, the crowd jumped, a free kick to the home team;
. between the cricket ball and the stumps, there was an uproar, up went the umpire's finger;
. into the track of another athlete, the offender was disqualified;

if such is the rule for a few hours of a game, why is it that in the bigger game called the life, when a helping hand tries to reach out to the offended, the offenders do not take it up in the right sense, including those who are believed to be next to God in saving human lives.

Years and years of suppression, of slavery, of entanglement - how do we expect the current generation to be in par with those who have committed these crimes. They could not enter the shrines of their own Gods, they could not get the education they wanted, they could not lead the life that they aspired - and all these not because they did not wish to do them, but because they were deprived of. The backward classes are backward right now because they were humiliated and made backward. Isn't it time for the offenders to repent for this and offer the supporting hand? One nuclear bomb and still the towns of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are facing the consequences; centuries of abasement and people are not ready to accept the criminal offense that they committed. Somehow, it really pricks me hard at my heart whenever I think about all these, my nerves refuse to cooperate in a feel of guilt. I can never imagine a life where if I walk through a street, all doors remain shut or if I enter a house, the place is washed off once I leave. I would have done one of these two things in that case -

1. I would have accomplished something really great and would have proved to them that I am worthier than any of those.

2. I would have committed suicide.

Well, the most famous argument is that reservations are going to "dilute the talent pool" - I would argue that instead of giving opportunities to some 20% of the population and making a pool out of it, give it to the entire population, by all laws of science, it should result in a better talent pool; we understand that none is born intelligent! After all, this talent pool is forged out of the scores secured in some examination. During my school days, I had no other job than to have a text book in my hand and to read it over and over again - no evening-table-cleaning business, no early-morning-newspaper-delivering business, absolutely nothing. No wonder I was able to make it to one of the most prestigious engineering institutions of the country. But how do we show that the unfortunate are also part of this society? I personally know a backward class student who works in a road-side restaurant during the evening and to everyone's surprise, he was one of the school toppers in his final examination. I would definitely give my MBBS seat to him, won't you?

One another ridiculous argument - the one who's "really talented will shine under any circumstance" and they end up citing the example of the Indian President. Doesn't the same argument hold good against the arguers too - those who are impoverished due to reservations can shine against any odds, even with the impoverishment. In one of the recent editions on a news channel about reservations, they showed up an example of a backward-class BITSian-IIMian who says reservations is not the solution. We are not at all speaking about those people who can make news, we are much more bothered about the vast majority who I believe have almost the same talent as any other candidate in the forward class, just that they have been stripped off of their ability to expose their talent.

The next one, this I consider absolutely senseless - "how is the small percentage benefiting from reservations going to help the remaining majority?". The counter-argument is simple - one backward class guy makes it to a big institution - his entire slum will know about it, this will slowly spread to other slums in the city, to other villages in the district. One more guy makes it, the entire state would come to know about this - people who hardly spoke about high school would now be speaking about the Indian Institute of Technology, they would know there's something called the JEE, there's something called the CAT - that's the exposure we are trying to diffuse in an attempt to create an India about which the same Indian President dreams of.

But how long should this be in practice, if the father gets a seat in reservation - should his son be allowed to make it through in the same way, whether the government should publish a white paper on the statistics of reservation and how it has affected the society, whether the creamy layer should be removed off the list, etc., I agree should be considered - but citing all these and complaining about the basic idea of reservations or what is officially called as one form of affirmative action is something that I can't digest. They say it's easy for the son of a movie director to get into the cinema world, we've been blessed to have benefited from our parents, it's time for us to recognize the lesser mortals of our own society. When we speak about reservations based on caste, it is assumed that a high majority of that caste is backward in terms of economy, of exposure and of execution. Exceptions do exist with any example, we will have to live with it if we are not able to eliminate it. I agree that there could be nothing like if we are able to implement reservations based on economy, but in a country where we keep moving on a red signal and where there is unofficial movement of money even to perform normal duties in a goverment office, I will not be surprised if Ambani's son gets a seat through reservation citing penury.

"Give them free primary education, give them financial help" - all these arguments are fine, they'll definitely help the next generation, but what answer do we have for the current generation? Why did women get 33% reservation in the parliament, because we know that they were suppressed in the Indian society and that they need representations to lift themselves up. The very presence of the backward classes in government institutions and offices itself shows that the reservation system has been successful during these fifty years of independence.

Let me just give an illustration to tell you straight of what I have been trying to convey. Imagine we never got the independence from the British in its current format. We got a kind of independence where there was no more suppression but a majority of government policies were influenced by the British; the admission policy of educational institutions, the recruitment policy in government offices, etc. In such a scenario, will an Indian (forward or backward class) ever get a seat in any of those? Does that mean Indians are not talented, no, just that the policies will not suit us. The children of the suppressed Indians will find it difficult to compete against the well-groomed English children. I bet in that case, there would be a protest from the forward class demanding reservations.

Let us come out of the selfish world where we think about ourselves, our fraternity, our neighbourhood, our children and let us peep our head beyond into the world of not philanthropy but at least of realizational empathy. If men don't help men, who else is going to? To all those who have been protesting this concept once the notorious minister made the statement, I have one question - before contemplating over facts that if this were vote-bank-politics, answer this question - if I shut you in a dark room for one week, will you be able to stay abreast with what had taken place around you during that time - will you know that Italy won the world cup, that the NASA space shuttle reached home safely, that there is an abyssal crisis in West Asia, that Maruti has lauched its new model of Wagon R - does that mean you are not fit to live in this world? All you need is a few days of interaction, a few weeks of exposure, a few reads through magazines and you will be back to how you were - this is the support that the backward classes need right now.

I am not sure if many of you reading through the above agreed to what I've been fencing, especially if you are in the reservation-impoverished class, but I completely understand what I've said till now and I'm completely aware of what it means. As I say it pricks me hard when I think of the slavery meted out to the unfortunates, I would also say that it pricks me even harder as I think that a meritorious student of the reservation-impoverished class would have to be ripped off of what he actually deserves. But I see the justification it caters and the tremendous vantage it brings to the country. I would just want to say this - they are struggling in the flood waters, let us give, at least to a few of them, a small corner in the cosy boat that we are in. We have shut them in dark while we enjoyed the light and the warmth of the sun, lets us knock their doors, let us show them the light. Jai Hind!