A Take on the Reservation Policy
If anyone watched NDTV's "The Big Fight" on Saturday, 8th of April
2006, without much doubt, all those who are against this excessive
reservation were completely appalled by what seems to be our future.
And the manner in which the debate was carried out, there seems to be
little scope or hope for betterment of what seems to be a mocking of
the ability of the capable and productive section of the youth of our
society.
There were two representatives of the Dalit community involved in this
debate, and they displayed what could be termed as probably the worst
possible way to represent their side of the debate, aside from being
two of the worst orators that the show has witnessed for a long time.
If this is the best representation the backward classes could offer,
it would be frightening to see what the remaining could have made out
of the debate. These representatives found it difficult to get their
points together, that is if they had any new ones besides the ones
they had memorized and kept repeating as a reply to every point put
forward by the opposing party. They were incapable of voicing their
views in a comprehensible manner, and resorted to making noise to try
and nullify what the other civilized member was trying to say. One
point raised by the host, "In an interview, the employer would first
ask the (management) candidate if he had appeared for the CAT or had
gone through quota," was repeatedly ignored or sidelined by the Dalit
member, and finally answered to contradict what he had earlier said,
with quite a sheepish expression on his face.
Why? Because if such reservations were enforced, then the employers
would not care about whether the student came from an IIM, but whether
he got their competing against and beating a thousand other more or
less equally competent candidates or by the help of some caste
certificate that got him there in place of a much more capable
individual who could have shown his countrymen's potential to the
world, but was prevented from doing so because another one of his
apparently "underprivileged" counterparts needed that seat desperately
enough to not put it to any great use in the future, and never be able
to reach the level of even the lowest paid lot that passed out of the
same institute with better grades yet.
If that wasn't enough, the "backward" section of the audience, who
seemed rather well off and pretty educated, quite contrary to the
claims they seemed to be making about their plight and how they should
be helped, weren't being particularly affable either. A certain young
member of the audience kept voicing his facts and statistics in a
rather loud and not very social manner, every one of which was proven
incorrect one after the other. Yet the young man wouldn't accept
defeat, and kept raising his voice for the most baseless of his
arguments when nobody seemed to be interested in what he was saying.
So we got a glimpse of what we could have in our colleges, sitting on
the bench next to us, eating mixture during class and saying "Tu
baahar mil" to the guy who proved him wrong in class.
On a little positive note, there was this elderly Sikh gentleman, who
stated that about 92% of Sikhs were still backward, but they don't
demand any reservation, because they want to match up to the
competition.
This is the kind of attitude that should be encouraged in the
backward groups of our society, that of trying to bring themselves up
to the level of the prevalent sections, rather that bring them down to
their own level. The present mindset just puts forward "If I can't
have it, neither can you" as the motive behind their every move.
Adding icing to the cake, in the conclusive thirty seconds allotted to
every member to voice their views, one Dalit member said a few things
that couldn't be understood much, and even if they could, not much
meaning could be drawn from them. The other Dalit member said that if
this battle were brought out onto the streets, the backward classes
would win hands down, owing to their great numbers. Such an anarchic
thought just go on to prove him a bigger failure as a representative
of his people, projecting the minds of his people as not those willing
to be civilized and educated, but as a barbaric lot bruteforcing its
competition, which doesn't even see itself as competition to anything
but itself. The basic conclusion that can be drawn is, if I can't beat
you by studying, I'll beat you up.
The backward classes say that it's a vice of society that the caste
system hasn't been abolished yet. But the truth is that they bask in
the sympathy offered to them by our government, and exploit it to make
things difficult for those who are supposedly more privileged than
them, although getting less privileges from the government. This
increase in reservation is only a step to promote discrimination in
our society. The caste system hasn't not been abolished because the
"higher" classes choose to follow it, but because the "lower" classes
refuse to renounce their "underprivileged" status as an excuse to keep
enjoying whatever is gifted to them by the government
Seeing all this, the author, who could be accused of not knowing much
about how "The System" works, felt rage, pure anger at how the society
he lives in is dematerializing.
.....But he chose to sublimate his anger, something that a Dalit could
have never done
2006, without much doubt, all those who are against this excessive
reservation were completely appalled by what seems to be our future.
And the manner in which the debate was carried out, there seems to be
little scope or hope for betterment of what seems to be a mocking of
the ability of the capable and productive section of the youth of our
society.
There were two representatives of the Dalit community involved in this
debate, and they displayed what could be termed as probably the worst
possible way to represent their side of the debate, aside from being
two of the worst orators that the show has witnessed for a long time.
If this is the best representation the backward classes could offer,
it would be frightening to see what the remaining could have made out
of the debate. These representatives found it difficult to get their
points together, that is if they had any new ones besides the ones
they had memorized and kept repeating as a reply to every point put
forward by the opposing party. They were incapable of voicing their
views in a comprehensible manner, and resorted to making noise to try
and nullify what the other civilized member was trying to say. One
point raised by the host, "In an interview, the employer would first
ask the (management) candidate if he had appeared for the CAT or had
gone through quota," was repeatedly ignored or sidelined by the Dalit
member, and finally answered to contradict what he had earlier said,
with quite a sheepish expression on his face.
Why? Because if such reservations were enforced, then the employers
would not care about whether the student came from an IIM, but whether
he got their competing against and beating a thousand other more or
less equally competent candidates or by the help of some caste
certificate that got him there in place of a much more capable
individual who could have shown his countrymen's potential to the
world, but was prevented from doing so because another one of his
apparently "underprivileged" counterparts needed that seat desperately
enough to not put it to any great use in the future, and never be able
to reach the level of even the lowest paid lot that passed out of the
same institute with better grades yet.
If that wasn't enough, the "backward" section of the audience, who
seemed rather well off and pretty educated, quite contrary to the
claims they seemed to be making about their plight and how they should
be helped, weren't being particularly affable either. A certain young
member of the audience kept voicing his facts and statistics in a
rather loud and not very social manner, every one of which was proven
incorrect one after the other. Yet the young man wouldn't accept
defeat, and kept raising his voice for the most baseless of his
arguments when nobody seemed to be interested in what he was saying.
So we got a glimpse of what we could have in our colleges, sitting on
the bench next to us, eating mixture during class and saying "Tu
baahar mil" to the guy who proved him wrong in class.
On a little positive note, there was this elderly Sikh gentleman, who
stated that about 92% of Sikhs were still backward, but they don't
demand any reservation, because they want to match up to the
competition.
This is the kind of attitude that should be encouraged in the
backward groups of our society, that of trying to bring themselves up
to the level of the prevalent sections, rather that bring them down to
their own level. The present mindset just puts forward "If I can't
have it, neither can you" as the motive behind their every move.
Adding icing to the cake, in the conclusive thirty seconds allotted to
every member to voice their views, one Dalit member said a few things
that couldn't be understood much, and even if they could, not much
meaning could be drawn from them. The other Dalit member said that if
this battle were brought out onto the streets, the backward classes
would win hands down, owing to their great numbers. Such an anarchic
thought just go on to prove him a bigger failure as a representative
of his people, projecting the minds of his people as not those willing
to be civilized and educated, but as a barbaric lot bruteforcing its
competition, which doesn't even see itself as competition to anything
but itself. The basic conclusion that can be drawn is, if I can't beat
you by studying, I'll beat you up.
The backward classes say that it's a vice of society that the caste
system hasn't been abolished yet. But the truth is that they bask in
the sympathy offered to them by our government, and exploit it to make
things difficult for those who are supposedly more privileged than
them, although getting less privileges from the government. This
increase in reservation is only a step to promote discrimination in
our society. The caste system hasn't not been abolished because the
"higher" classes choose to follow it, but because the "lower" classes
refuse to renounce their "underprivileged" status as an excuse to keep
enjoying whatever is gifted to them by the government
Seeing all this, the author, who could be accused of not knowing much
about how "The System" works, felt rage, pure anger at how the society
he lives in is dematerializing.
.....But he chose to sublimate his anger, something that a Dalit could
have never done
posted by Bhaskar Azad at 2:51 PM
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