Dear Sangom Sir,
I was not posting into this thread so far as there were no clear lines of arguments emerging. Now that you have somewhat summarised these in your post I think I may join and post my humble views.
In all the discussions which we have had so far about the reservation system, we have, I think, forgotten a few very vital points.
1. From Independence till probably today, the machinery for implementing the reservation or other pro-active schemes has been the governmental machinery which, even today, consists predominantly of the upper castes, who have hardly any change of heart because of the ideal that they are now in a free India where all people are supposed to be equal. (I would blame hinduism for nurturing this sort of an irreparably faulty mindset, but that is a different topic.)
You are clubbing all the castes including the brahmins by your term upper castes. Are you not aware that brahmins have been banished from all important decision making roles? Indian parliament which is the ultimate decision making authority is comprised of a majority of the dominant castes exclusing brahmins. So I take it that you are saying the dominant castes have hardly any change of heart and feel all powerful because of their new-found political power. It is this political power which comes from the numbers that had emboldened them in including their castes in the list of beneficiaries for reservation. Yes they declared themselves to be downtrodden and have given themselves the benefits of reservation which is a largesse. In this context it is worth remembering that brahmins were instrumental in bringing in the concept of reservation into the Indian Constitution and that the original plot was hijacked by the dominant castes later. Would you still blame hinduism for this?
Shri Raju,
I was working in Reserve Bank of India from 1965 onwards and, as you know, the Bank has to follow the reservation policy. The policy was initially for SCs and STs only. But even by the middle of the eighties there was an enormous amount of backlog in filling up the quota; some study or enquiry was conducted by GOI regarding this - not only in RBI but all the departments/organistaions where reservation of posts applied. I do not know the findings of the study but I have a fairly good idea as to why such a huge backlog did come about. I can only talk about it in private.
Then the GOI insisted that special recruitment drives be made for SCs/STs; that also did not succeed because a certain amount of scuttling continued. That is when the GOI said no further staff appointments from general category unless the quota is filled to certain prescribed limits. (I don't remember the details because I was never directly connected with recruitments.) It was only thereafter that some improvement came about. I do not know how it is now.
From 1947 till about the early 1960's and to some extent in the mass expansion of nationalised banks (1969 was bank nationalisation) you will find almost all tabras getting appointed. There was no dearth of employment for them at the entry stage like junior clerks, junior officers etc. LIC was another behemoth which absorbed a large number of brahmin candidates in those days. All this you can verify by just looking around and finding how many of my generation got into these avenues.
In IAS and similar posts (except perhaps IPS which was not a preferred category of Tabras) brahmins got in not only from TN but also from WB, Orissa etc. Hence it is oversimplification to say that "brahmins have been banished from all important decision making roles" immediately after 1947. Even in the case of TN, I think you can stretch it back to 1967 maximum, not earlier. During these twenty years what steps were made by the "machinery" to deliver development to the downtrodden? Very little.
So, let us not discuss in a partisan way as if mistakes are never with Brahmans. That is my humble request.
And, I for one, will not bet that had Brahmans been given the power and facilities to carry out development of SCs/STs, they would have done any better than the "dominant castes" which you refer to. (Actually I am not clear about whom you refer to by this term - in the Parliament.)
Hence, what we were, are and probably will in future be, doing, is similar to dressing a wound with highly contaminated water, gauze and outdated, fungus-infected ointment; will it ever cure the wound? But in the real scenario of the reservations/pro-active schemes, it is not just directly allotting jobs which I am referring to here, but improving the total living conditions of the abjectly poor and downtrodden. These have been neglected very much. That this has been yet another unpardonable crime on the part of the upper castes vested interests, only adds to the historical atrocities that our society has been committing on these people, based on certain religious tenets.
Yes this is an unpardonable crime on the part of all the dominant castes. But where does religious tenets come into this? Religion has lost its relevance long back in the matter of exploitation of panchamans. Economic and other factors have taken over and religion has been thrown overboard. It is unfortunate that our intelligentsia is still harping on religion as the main reason for the casteism.Who is bothered about the religious tenets? If people(hindus) are really bothered or committed to following the religious tenets, are they following all other tenets which are there in the same religion (like muslims do it with total loyalty)? So it is just a question of convenience. What is convenient among the religious tenets are taken and what is inconvenient is discarded. In other words the brute majority decides what should be done with religious tenets. What do you say about this?
Either my English is insufficient or you see a red rag by the very word "religion" being blamed. I think I had said
"That this has been yet another unpardonable crime on the part of the upper castes vested interests, only adds to the historical atrocities that our society has been committing on these people, based on certain religious tenets." I consider that caste-based discrimination, denial of opportunities for rising up in life, practice of untouchability, denial of entry into the areas of the higher groups and temples, etc., arose oout of religious tenets and nothing else. If you feel differently, kindly substantiate your point/s. Your rhetoric "Who is bothered about the religious tenets? If people(hindus) are really bothered or committed to following the religious tenets, are they following all other tenets which are there in the same religion (like muslims do it with total loyalty)?
" is very much irrelevant, I feel. If someone does something as per religion is it necessary that he should follow every dot and comma of religion before religion can be faulted? For that matter on what basis do you make the blanket pronouncement that all Muslims do follow religion with total loyalty? I request you not to get emotional when posting; irrespective of whose ideas are correct (yours or mine) the discussion here is not going to change government action or history even a wee bit.
Now, can we throw away the infected water, cotton and ointment and replace with good ones in this case? No. So, what is to be done is to disinfect them; the governments and policy makers slept over it for more than 60 years and I think the disinfectant is coming naturally in the form of the maoists waging war- this may be burning the instruments perhaps, but what remains might become disinfected.
This is the first time I am coming across such a specious argument linking maoists with castes. None of the known maoist leaders are sold on the idea of interpreting the poor peoples/ uprising in terms of castes. If you bring in caste into the maoists uprising it is a disrespect you are inflicting on those rebels. When a government dominated by dominant castes from parliament to the local police chowki usurps all the wealth of the nation to themselves by legal and illegal means, the harassed poor people take to arms and we have these maoists. I can write more about the maoist uprising but I stop with this.
I don't know whether Maoists get linked to caste in my writing; I feel not. What I said was the Govt slept over the non-delivery of development to the bottom-most levels who may be SCs, STs, Dalits or some other group. These groups have now united under the leadership of the Maoists, that is all to register their resentment as powerfully as is possible for them. You feel, it seems to me, that it has nothing to do with non-delivery of developmental benefits, and nothing to do with castes; but exploitation is a sure sign of neglect and will imply that the people did not derive any benefits from Governmental programmes. In case you feel that this reading of the situation by me is erroneous, kindly elucidate.
There is no reason to become astounded as long as the opponents of reservation talk about the sneaking in of ineligible castes into the fold of reservation. No one, this includes brahmins, have any objection when we talk about the reservation for SC/STs. But the reservation for others (called by that enigmatic term shudras) is just a fraud. If you see in it any conspiracy on the part of brahmins you are wrong.
We are lucky today that Brahmans do not enjoy much power. But I presume you are young and do not know the nepotism resorted to by Brahmins when they had the chance. I will make a separate post about it after some hours, because typing is time-taking for me.
This tendency may be there among the SC/STs who have climbed up the economic ladder. It is definitely not noticeable among the dominant castes and it is understandable.
I am talking here mainly of the targetted beneficiaries which is SCs, STs and the OBC/MBC; I somehow do not get so much exercised by other FCs sneaking in, though I condemn it as much as I can. But a section of the membership here seems to be more enraged by the other FCs getting some out of the way benefit while we tabras are unable to do the same; I feel that if only the same loophole was available for tabras also, all this emotion and opposition would not have come about!
To put the discussion on a proper perspective and to pull it out of partisan chest-beating, I have made my contribution. Cheers.
Chest-beating, AFAIK, means lamenting some loss to oneself, like death of one's husband. If this is correct, it is good that your post brings in a certain amount of chest-beating for the perceived inequitable losses to the tabras!
