Reservation

For 5000 long and tedius years, the so called upper castes, exploited the so called lower castes. The castist society was a failure since inception. It stifled the notion of freedom of mind and ideas, by adjugating a son to father's profession irrespective of his capabilities and aptitude. I think the payback can be made by opening our hearts and taking the entire reservation hullabaloo with a pinch of salt. Some one needs to put in Mr. Arjun Singh's notice that the important agenda could be to improve the quality of municipal corporation and the village schools where most backward sections of society inhabit. Why not give reservation in primary schools to deprieved sections, why not improve the resources in government schools which operate in shed like buildings and why not provide enhanced medical facilities something which Prof Amartya Sen talked about. Prof Sen in his Nobel aclaimed thesis linked three fundamental state responsibilities to Economic developement, namely, i) education ii) justice iii) health care. Has our polity been successfull in the three above mentioned parameters over the last 60 years is the answer of our follies.

The government must come out with a wholesome plan to combat the menace of caste based discrimination and uplift all people from the deprieved sections within a given timeframe, say the next 25 years. To privilege a clan on account of, both economic and academic backwardness is in no way incorrect, but contention arises on the issue of methodology of this privilege. Is it right to pay Peter by robbing Paul?

"Disability is a matter of perception, you do one thing good and you are wanted by someone." These are the golden words of the tennis legend Martina Navratilova. It will take a huge and herculean will to not think oneself as weak and deprieved, to break the cluches of politicians who think what they do is always right, and to create pan national leaders who will be role models not for one section of the society but for the entire gamut of mass which constitute our populance. Always remember that the private sector in India became competitive and went global only when the government shunned protectionism and liberalized the economy.

Nothing can be achieved unless the youth from the historically persecuted sections, the scheduled castes/tribes and the other backward castes speak for themselves and their desire to be competitive and not protected.