RESERVATION: HOW CONSTITUTIONAL IS IT ?

RESERVATION: HOW CONSTITUTIONAL IS IT?

Young citizens of India are very much aware of the provision made by the Government of India called Reservation! A boon to some while a curse to others, it is one of the ace cards of caste politics used often by politicians to gain political vendetta. Nowadays days we have reservation in every sphere. How beneficial is it to the nation in the long run, does it achieve its cause, what harm does it do, and, above all is it constitutional? I shall give my ideas in the following paragraphs.
When a reservation is provided to a particular community either for education or jobs it is done so as to relieve the community of social burdens and to earn a respectable place in the social hierarchy. We have 15 percent reservation for scheduled castes in the public job sector. Long ago when the nation was newborn the majority of the population, that of backward castes was poor and oppressed. The leaders therefore decided to grant them reservation in education. This provided the oppressed with a neat platform to come up in life. Later, the same community began enjoying reservation in the job sector too! So the people got good education as well as great secured jobs, all provided by the government.

All this sounds good for the tribal, scheduled castes etc,. Later vote bank politics came into play and the politicians began granting reservations to the Muslims, Christians etc,. The surprising fact was that the Muslims and the Christians came to be listed under the backward caste category!! These religions are not supposed to have any caste of their own and they even proclaim this very proudly! But when it comes to getting easy jobs and education they are no
backwards. Today, only about less than 30% of the seats in a government education institution is via open competition (except the IITs). Now what all this reservation does is it makes the job all the more easier for the already well to do Muslim or a scheduled caste family. These people study pathetically, get about some 60% and get a seat in some top ranked institution! Later they also get a govt. job with ease. Good for one generation, but the thing becomes more annoying when the son of the above person is provided with the same provision.
The question is, does reservations really help the oppressed or is it a case of nurturing a single community even if it is not worth all the facilities! What about the people who burn the midnight oil and score great marks but only get into some average institution, just because they are from the forward community? We thereby lose precious talents for our industries and our workforce consists of people who simply do not deserve their jobs. There is a proposal to give 5% reservation to Muslims in the public sector. On an election promise made by the Andhra CM YSR Reddy an attempt was made to provide 15%reservation to Muslims. But thanks to the judicial system the High court put down the move saying it was unconstitutional!
Ours is a socialist, democratic, SECULAR, sovereign republic. Secular means that the state does not have any discrimination on the basis of caste, creed, race or religion! But what happens here is a total paradox! The state gives reservations on the excuse of safeguarding secular interests!!! At what cost, I ask, at the cost of quality manpower? The reasons the IITs are a success story is because they have no reservations (there is a proposal to introduce one)! The talent coming out there is pure and based on hard work. The private sector has no reservation and companies insist on quality manpower because these are the people who will help achieve success for a company internationally. When, the company is forced to take a candidate even if it does not feel he/she is capable, the standard of the company falls.

More so it is a question of challenging the rights of a private establishment to choose its own workforce!! It is important for the govt. to give reservations on the basis of economic status and not based on castes. The socially backward may not be economically backward and the socially rich need not be financially well off!
PS: These are the authors own viewpoint and do not represent the feelings of any community. Any comments are welcome to vivek1086@rediffmail.com