In God We Believe…
In God we believe, rest everyone else brings data to the table. These were the famous words uttered by Narayana Murthy, co-founder of Infosys Technologies. Sadly, when it comes to governmental decision-making (or lack of it), data and facts are not just ignored, but abhorred by the political class. One such case is the vexed issue of providing reservations in government jobs and admissions to government educational institutions. It is widely known and accepted that Mandal Commission recommendations completely disregarded factual position with respect to the percentage of scheduled castes / tribes and other backward classes. After an unprecedented uproar where many a youth even went on to commit suicide, the recommendations were accepted by the Parliament and a supporting legislation was enacted.
While the scars of Mandal Commission are still fresh in public memory, the government is once again fiddling with the idea of implementing reservation in promotions for all government jobs. It should be remembered that Mandal Commission had clearly mentioned that promotions in government jobs should be kept out of the ambit of reservations. Call it playing to the galleries or driving a caste-based wedge through the society, some of the state governments enacted legislations contrary to rules of sound governance. When the matter was challenged in the constitutional courts of the country, the courts found the newly enacted law, in its current form, mandating reservation in promotions to be violative of basic structure of the Constitution of India. The Courts have basically contended that the reservation in promotions extended by state governments is not backed by any facts or data, and therefore cannot be granted because it’s against the spirit of equality which is the cornerstone of any affirmative action. On the contrary, such politically motivated actions may put the general category candidates at disadvantage, which was never the intention of the founding fathers of our Constitution.
Instead of taking recommendations of the Supreme Court in the right spirit, the UPA government has turned this into a battle between Judiciary and other organs of the State. Parliamentarians have also jumped in support of reservations in promotions, without understanding the real issue. A reasonable response by the Government would have been to find ways to back its reservation related decisions with the help of authentic data. True to its entrenched attitudes of mere sloganeering and very little meaningful action, the political class has got together on how to fast-track a Constitutional amendment to satisfy its collective ego.
Undoubtedly, it is a complex matter but let’s look at some of the unstated issues that are driving the political class to such unreasonable actions:
1. Utter lack of knowledge and understanding of the ideals enshrined in the Constitution. The makers of the Constitution just wanted a definitive, time-bound mechanism to uplift the underprivileged sections of the society. Original constitution had such a provision for 10 years only
2. Unshakeable belief of the ruling parties in the Centre and the states that they can always use caste based reservations to their advantage, and get re-elected based on such actions. Because this bait worked a few times as an alternative to bad governance has further led the politicians to believe that this is one silver bullet when it comes to gaining electoral share
3. Lack of steel and firmness shown by opposition parties to vehemently oppose such unreasonable and malafide legislations. They fear that they may offend that section of society whose undue right of reservations is taken away. This unfounded fear in such opposition parties can be attributed to not knowing the real demands of the people i.e. durable solutions that build a united, progressive society and not merely breadcrumb dole-outs that don’t uplift the backward classes.
4. A lingering effort on the part of political class to establish supremacy over the judiciary. Constitutional amendments are a tool in the hands of politicians that must be used sparingly and must be exercised only to address an emergent need of the society that was not apparent to founding fathers of the Constitution. However, the politicians have abused this important tool constantly and whenever judiciary has stepped in to arrest this political decadence, battle cry was given by the political class
5. Lack of educated view among the scheduled castes / tribes that such a reservation is not going to help their community in the long term, and is just a short-term gambit of the ruling parties to win over their votes. Little do they know that the current crop of politicians has mastered the art of inciting their feelings to just gain the votes, but not do any institutional reform that can make caste irrelevant in the society
6. Apathy of the general category voters towards such unreasonable actions of the political class. Such is the state of helplessness and hopelessness that has crept into the psyche of citizens, hardly do they feel like raising their voice and demanding sensible actions from the government. Although, there have been some social movements of late that have tried to question the government on such issues, but controversies around their political linkages led to the demise of movements such as one led by Anna Hazare.
In any case, I’m not a big fan of the caste being a sole parameter for granting reservations, but that’s a separate and a longer discussion. Nonetheless, reservations if provided, can be useful only if they lead to a more equal society where caste gradually becomes irrelevant. Instead, the current system, in absence of statistics and proper implementation review mechanism has led to resources (including promotions) being hogged only by a certain section of SC / ST candidates. All that is being asked by the Supreme Court is to ensure that distribution of resources within the depressed classes is equitable, and it should not impact the efficiency of administration.
My interpretation of this whole situation is quite simple and can be funny for some. The judiciary is asking the government to cross the finish line of the race, but a lazy and arrogant government is saying don’t tell me how to finish the race. I won’t travel the distance to cross the finish line, instead I’ll draw in the finish line behind me and prove that I’ve already finished the race. That in a nutshell is the attitude of the political class when they talk of constitutional amendment and not fact-based institutional reform, as far as reservation in promotions is considered.
In God we believe, rest everyone else brings data to the table. These were the famous words uttered by Narayana Murthy, co-founder of Infosys Technologies. Sadly, when it comes to governmental decision-making (or lack of it), data and facts are not just ignored, but abhorred by the political class. One such case is the vexed issue of providing reservations in government jobs and admissions to government educational institutions. It is widely known and accepted that Mandal Commission recommendations completely disregarded factual position with respect to the percentage of scheduled castes / tribes and other backward classes. After an unprecedented uproar where many a youth even went on to commit suicide, the recommendations were accepted by the Parliament and a supporting legislation was enacted.
While the scars of Mandal Commission are still fresh in public memory, the government is once again fiddling with the idea of implementing reservation in promotions for all government jobs. It should be remembered that Mandal Commission had clearly mentioned that promotions in government jobs should be kept out of the ambit of reservations. Call it playing to the galleries or driving a caste-based wedge through the society, some of the state governments enacted legislations contrary to rules of sound governance. When the matter was challenged in the constitutional courts of the country, the courts found the newly enacted law, in its current form, mandating reservation in promotions to be violative of basic structure of the Constitution of India. The Courts have basically contended that the reservation in promotions extended by state governments is not backed by any facts or data, and therefore cannot be granted because it’s against the spirit of equality which is the cornerstone of any affirmative action. On the contrary, such politically motivated actions may put the general category candidates at disadvantage, which was never the intention of the founding fathers of our Constitution.
Instead of taking recommendations of the Supreme Court in the right spirit, the UPA government has turned this into a battle between Judiciary and other organs of the State. Parliamentarians have also jumped in support of reservations in promotions, without understanding the real issue. A reasonable response by the Government would have been to find ways to back its reservation related decisions with the help of authentic data. True to its entrenched attitudes of mere sloganeering and very little meaningful action, the political class has got together on how to fast-track a Constitutional amendment to satisfy its collective ego.
Undoubtedly, it is a complex matter but let’s look at some of the unstated issues that are driving the political class to such unreasonable actions:
1. Utter lack of knowledge and understanding of the ideals enshrined in the Constitution. The makers of the Constitution just wanted a definitive, time-bound mechanism to uplift the underprivileged sections of the society. Original constitution had such a provision for 10 years only
2. Unshakeable belief of the ruling parties in the Centre and the states that they can always use caste based reservations to their advantage, and get re-elected based on such actions. Because this bait worked a few times as an alternative to bad governance has further led the politicians to believe that this is one silver bullet when it comes to gaining electoral share
3. Lack of steel and firmness shown by opposition parties to vehemently oppose such unreasonable and malafide legislations. They fear that they may offend that section of society whose undue right of reservations is taken away. This unfounded fear in such opposition parties can be attributed to not knowing the real demands of the people i.e. durable solutions that build a united, progressive society and not merely breadcrumb dole-outs that don’t uplift the backward classes.
4. A lingering effort on the part of political class to establish supremacy over the judiciary. Constitutional amendments are a tool in the hands of politicians that must be used sparingly and must be exercised only to address an emergent need of the society that was not apparent to founding fathers of the Constitution. However, the politicians have abused this important tool constantly and whenever judiciary has stepped in to arrest this political decadence, battle cry was given by the political class
5. Lack of educated view among the scheduled castes / tribes that such a reservation is not going to help their community in the long term, and is just a short-term gambit of the ruling parties to win over their votes. Little do they know that the current crop of politicians has mastered the art of inciting their feelings to just gain the votes, but not do any institutional reform that can make caste irrelevant in the society
6. Apathy of the general category voters towards such unreasonable actions of the political class. Such is the state of helplessness and hopelessness that has crept into the psyche of citizens, hardly do they feel like raising their voice and demanding sensible actions from the government. Although, there have been some social movements of late that have tried to question the government on such issues, but controversies around their political linkages led to the demise of movements such as one led by Anna Hazare.
In any case, I’m not a big fan of the caste being a sole parameter for granting reservations, but that’s a separate and a longer discussion. Nonetheless, reservations if provided, can be useful only if they lead to a more equal society where caste gradually becomes irrelevant. Instead, the current system, in absence of statistics and proper implementation review mechanism has led to resources (including promotions) being hogged only by a certain section of SC / ST candidates. All that is being asked by the Supreme Court is to ensure that distribution of resources within the depressed classes is equitable, and it should not impact the efficiency of administration.
My interpretation of this whole situation is quite simple and can be funny for some. The judiciary is asking the government to cross the finish line of the race, but a lazy and arrogant government is saying don’t tell me how to finish the race. I won’t travel the distance to cross the finish line, instead I’ll draw in the finish line behind me and prove that I’ve already finished the race. That in a nutshell is the attitude of the political class when they talk of constitutional amendment and not fact-based institutional reform, as far as reservation in promotions is considered.
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