More On the Job Reservation Policy Front
Following-up on Amit’s earlier post, New Economist has linked to a new paper by by Vani K. Borooah, Amaresh Dubey and Sriya Iyer: Has Job Reservation Been Effective? Caste, Religion, and Economic Status in India. You can find more details over at New Economist. Sriya Iyer’s work on fertility and religion is very interesting, and I will be posting on this under separate cover.
India has successfully used democracy to reinforce feudalistic casteism. I think Andre Betelle has written about this paradoxical phenomenon. Reservation, more than anything else, has become a tool for caste-based vote bank politics. With liberalization and privatization, I thought, the caste system was rapidly becoming irrelevant. The politicians will have none of it and want to extend the reservation system to the private sector. In my opinion, you never underestimate the indian politician’s ability to screw India. So, within a few years, expect reservations in the private sector. Politicians will be outdoing one another by raising the quotas. A new bureacracy will be created to ensure that private sector complies with the reservations. That is, more government meddling, while the industry is demanding less regulations.
Comment by sv — December 21, 2005 @ 2:13 pm
Caste and Reservation
This problem needs to be confronted rationally. Those lower in castes, today, are in that state, ie a state of lower intellectual ability, due to them being prevented from competing with the high caste. We are perpetuating this state, ie of still preventing any sort of competition, by reserving for them what they would have got by competing, without competition(remember, in Mahabharat, Karna joined the enemy force forgetting his family to express his gratitude for permitting him, one lower in caste, to take part in a competition).
To put briefly, no caste is cent percent forward or backward. Forward caste can be considered as the one with more than 99 percent of population possessing above average abilities and backward as the one with more than 99 percent having below average abilities. Reservation, by affording greater competition, elevates those below average, among upper caste, to above average level, while, relegating even those few who does not happen to be below average to below average status by removing all competition.
…………This is not a new finding. Reservation was adopted by congress as the method of uplifting those downtrodden leading to constitutional safeguards which we keep extending ad infinitum. This decision,even though not ‘well thought about’, was widely accepted among the then congress leaders, ie progressives like Nehru, as a via media compared to Mahatma’s suggestions, especially that leading to each caste Hindu adopting one Harijan, reinforcing such adoption by having marital alliance between that Harijan and the caste Hindu. Hence this was accepted without much thought, especially about it’s disadvantages. This needs serious consideration.
Comment by roy — January 28, 2007 @ 6:47 pm
Hello,
I thought reservation formul is not fare for indians because reservation handicapped to indian peoples.after findout reservations they wouldn’t
to do lobor for your nescessties.whenever Reservation has been lodged in indian democracy absolutly
fault is there.if those person who involved for givin reservation right for socialy,economicaly and politicaly background peoples.they have worng perception for dovelopment procedure for india.
you know,they can not considering about whose person they are finding reservation and can not achieved any plus point in your life ,you have seen that todays situation. conditions are only politicals personals benifit for orientation of reservation.
Comment by shivom gupta — August 13, 2007 @ 7:10 pm
Hi,
There has been enough discussion on the right and wrongs of reservation policy but what about the impact studies? How many studies have come out with concrete results (both analytical and experimental)about who gets the benefit of reservation policy? A good number of socio-economic studies on this issue can actually bring out the real state of affair in the society and accordingly changes can be made in this direction.
Niyati Padhi
Comment by Niyati Padhi — November 24, 2007 @ 12:13 pm
Hi,
According to me,reservation and qouta both are the controversial topics of idean economy as wel as others,
Comment by Vivek Ambastha IIM-A — December 29, 2007 @ 2:52 pm
Our Indian reservation Policy based on caste system and also economically poor/weeker in the society.Also i say that Indian any one can follow any religion.Why if scheduled cast people fallowed christianity their not not get any reservation in the SC categorty.Sametime if backward cast people followed christianity they considered as same category.
Comment by S.MOSAI — March 15, 2008 @ 11:07 am
From my point of view as i see it is(reservation) most horrible thing which could happen to our econony. As we all know the growing indian economy has been on a boost since last 1 or 1 1/2 decades in which or private sect contributed the most; without ny doubt and it is very obvious that the entrepreneur who made this boom possible made their way without any reservation but from their own hard workmanship & knowledge.
when our constituion was formalised the members knew that it ill cast adverse effect on every aspect irrespective to econy alone to as a nation in whole thats why they suggested reservation for a limited period of 15 yrs.
i m nt saying 2 just tear off the reservation page but 2 specifically give this privillege 2 those who need it and as well as who is eligible 4 it. their are some downtrodden & underprivileged population who r nt getting enuogh chances and the easiest way 2 give them a chance 2 make their way in to main stream of indian society. thier should b some eligibility criteria some minimum qualification 4 attaining reservation.
Comment by Shashank Verma — June 1, 2008 @ 7:00 pm
I am an NRI, so I am not affected by any decision about reservation in India. I am, however, very surprised that this issue has been going on for years. We have so many intelligent people in this country, then why aren’t we thinking Out Of The Box solutions. The issue of reservation is complex and it will not have a simple solution. Also, It is not going to go away so easily.
I agree with the need for reservation for under privileged sections of the society. At the same time it is also true, that replacing deserving and talented candidates with one how need support will not benefit the society. It can in fact be very counter productive. Good examples for this is sports people, doctors, engineers, scientists, teachers, pilots etc. However we can certainly have public service ( up to certain entry level), lawyers, drivers, politicians and some other jobs that can be easily done by candidates from reserved quota. Choose some low risk professions and have 100% reservations in them instead of having 10,20,30% reservations in all professions, including some critical professions. Win Win situation for all… what do you say ?
Comment by Avnish Bhardwaz — June 2, 2008 @ 2:13 pm
Actually resevation was formed for 10 years at that time but now it is almost 60 years .the castes and communities havent increased in such a huge time that can not achieve it till 100 years too.
because of this resevation policy the cream talent is going overeas because they dont want to work under a stupid boss.
america is ruling the IT sector because of indian brains.Talented and general belonging student dont want to even apply for government sector jobs because they know their higher % cannot fight the high rate of reservation.
thats the only why hat india is not progressing,
the reservation was based on the thought that those respective communities have the same talent but they wernt getting opportunities.so now that condition doesnt exist now .those communities have their strong union then let them show their talent on their own strenght.
Comment by Juhi Sharma — June 4, 2008 @ 9:06 pm
edward,
the paper uses information from the 55th round of the nsso.. between the 55th round and 61st the population of the obcs rose by 8-10%..which means the population of hindu ‘forward castes’ went down by a similar percentage..i don’t need to tell you that this changes the very foundation of all analyses in this paper.
does it really deserve any serious attention? not more than a pamphlet by an iyer, a borooah and a dubey.
Comment by kuffir — June 6, 2008 @ 2:43 pm