India's Caste based Reservation system: Only for Reserved and nothing for Deserved?

        We Probably hear it many times and forget it the next minute. Does it actually affect us? or it is just a political hoax? India's caste based reservation system has more often than not attracted criticisms from various sections of the society especially from the unreserved "category". Its fairness have been questioned frequently.

The long ongoing and probably never ending debate about this caste based reservation system have well fortified arguments in both favor and against it. But putting modern day and India's growth in context, which one has an edge over the other?

To understand it, we have to look at its history and know why did we even needed it in the first place. This reservation system is a direct result of the discrimination in our age old caste system which exist in our society. At first we had only 4 of them known as varnas, That are Brahmins (The learned class), Kshatriya (The Warrior class), Vaishyas (The Trading class) and lastly Shudras (The ones who did menial jobs).  These in time divided into numerous other castes and the discrimination faced by lower castes from upper castes was the reason which brought this reservation system in India. 

If we simplify matters more, Then this system was introduced to ease access to seats in Government institutions whether for jobs or education. The reserved category cutoff requirements are lower than the general or unreserved category and in most cases the difference between them is like sky and land..

It is said that it was William Hunter and Jyotirao Phule in 1882 originally concieved the idea of caste based reservation system. In India, It is Governed by Govt. Policies which are backed by the Constitution itself. Although  the current reservation system which you see today was in its true sense was introduced in 133, When the Prime Minister of Britain Mr. Ramsay McDonald introduced the communal award which made provisions for separate system for different castes and religions.

Well, Enough with the history i guess. I know my readers have already understood the backdrop. Let's focus on further development. 

Have you all heard about the Mandal Commission? If not then let me enlighten your already busy minds, In short, It was a commission setup by the President of India in December 1978 under the chairmanship of B.P. Mandal. The commission in its report said that since OBCs are approximately 52% of the total population of India therefore atleast 27% of the govt. jobs should be reserved for them The Commission also reported that there are almost 3,743 castes in OBC category and around more 2,108 castes belonged to underprivileged  "Depressed backward castes".

Phew! That's some incredible amount of castes, isn't it? The infamous Indra Sawhney v. Union of India case of 1992 had made the provision of applying a 'Creamy Layer' on OBC reservation. It meant that candidates whose family income is ore than 8 Lakhs per anum shall be treated as General category candidate only. In this case, The Supreme Court of India also said that reservations should not exceed more than 50% of the total seats. And yet again our beloved Parliament responded by making 77th Constitutional Amendment which introduced article 16(4A) which gave states the rights to decide SC-ST reservation upto their choice. 

Another case of 2006 also known as M. Nagraj v. Union of India case 2006 upholded the constitutional validity of Article 16(4A). The Hon'able Supreme Court also said that these reservations shall not hamper the overall efficiency of in the Govt. sector offices and administration. Is this a joke? We all know how "Efficient" our Govt. offices and administration are. Never get work done in time. 

In 2019, The current Modi Govt. brought 103rd Constitutional Amendment which provided 10% reservation for 'Economically backward' category or EWS. So, All the reservation under under OBC, SC, ST and EWS now equals 60% of the total seats. You may think that this is the violation of  the 1992 judgement of Supreme Court. But You're wrong again (because you're middle class general candidate). On 7th November, 2022, A five judge bench headed by Chief Justice UU Lalit has upholded the constitutional validity of of 103rd Amendment which gave 10% reservation to EWS category.

"Now That's a lot of reservation"

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Moving on. The dispute arises when the requirement gap between UR and reserved categories becomes too much. Let me give you an example- Suppose there are 100 job vacancies, out of which 60 are reserved and only 40 are left for UR to fight over. After the eligibility exam, An UR category candidate who got 41 rank could not get the job but some one from SC  category gets job with rank 150. Do you think its fair? you maybe confused. Let me give you some context, Suppose SC candidate is from a backward area in Jharkhand with no good educational facilities and poor financial condition. What's your reaction now? you'll probably say yes considering the hardships that candidate's struggle.

Now suppose the opposite. The SC candidate was born and raised in Greater Kailash area of Delhi with his father working as a secretary in Delhi Govt.. His schooling has been done from an expensive private school and did his graduation from Amity University. Now what do you think? Do you think he deserves the reservation?

Such discrepancies have been the root cause of protests against this 'discriminatory' nature of caste reservations in India. There is constant debate on how to counter/stop such discrepancies. There are many proposed solutions out of which two solutions seems very logical.

The First one is to add the creamy layer in all reserved castes except EWS. I have already explained what creamy layer concept is. Also this concept is already applied to OBC category and people say ot should be applicable to SCs and STs as well. 

The Second one is to add a provision that candidates will only get the benefits of reservation upto only the Initial appointments and not extended into promotions. That's another practical solution to boost the productivity of govt. sector as promotion will be given only on the basis of hard work and not on the basis of caste you belong. 

These two are coming out as the most favored solutions to counter the disparities between reserved and the un-reserved categories. But are these actually implementable? This calls for a serious and deep discussion.

If you think that yes they are implementable then let me warn you. IT IS NOT EASY. Many hurdles are in the way of it. Initially when the reservation was given out in Independent India, It was never meant to continue 'forever'. It was supposed to end after a certain period of time. But thanks to the vote bank politics of our Country it was never ended and is continued till date. No political party has ever tried to end this reservation. For them their vote banks are more important  rather than the overall growth and prosperity of nation. That's Democracy for you all.

But they do need our vote. If we start voting more carefully instead of being prey to these predatory politics then they'll have to do something about it. I do hope some steps will be taken against this. Rest I'll leave you with a simple question. Is the reservation system only for reserved and not for deserved?

                                                                                                                                       - Nipun Mehrotra