Reservation - is it Rotten yet? how many times we fight over this? here is my take on the subject: First, a FREE buck will never help anyone. Social inequality - Economic inequality, I don't see a major difference. What I mean is a large section of people were oppressed for god knows how long making them socially inequal by a lessor group of people for want of power or whatever they were after. So that invariably made the oppressed class economically backward too. It's not like a Dalit was very well off and was still oppressed. So now what is the real problem -- How do we eradicate this social inequality with an ultimate goal of becoming a just and prosperous society. What do we do to achieve this goal, first thing we need is to educate people, I cannot stress this point enough, that all men/women are equal, they all can develop similiarly given similar opportunities. This should be the basis and crux of education with whatever academic interests we choose to pursue. Both oppressor and oppressed should understand that we are aiming for a new order of siciety where all sections of people are on a common ground. So just imagine a very rough surface that needs to be smoothened, what do we do, we chip away the raised parts and fill the low parts and brush it a little bit to make it a level surface. This does not meen that we go rob the rich (oppressors) and give the wealth to the poor (oppressed) because society is not just a rough surface that can be smoothened in this manner. So the reservations came into being, whether that was a good idea or not, if there was a better way to deal with the problem or not is a different matter (and the way we are fighting even today, shows that no one has a better idea or even if someone has, it never made it to the people who can implement it). And there had to be laws making any kind of descrimination a punishable crime. All religious institutions, educational institutions and etc. cannot discriminate people based on their social status. So these things were implemented. But did it change the mindset of people to accept the basic fact that all humans are equal? I think NOT, so the real problem has not been addressed at all. Until we address that problem nothing will change we will continue to fight and these spineless, corrupt politicians will get their way - they are the real OPPRESSORS of current generation.
So, here is something that came to my mind - how about making another law - lets say - Make caste conversions legal, just like a Hindu can covert to muslim or a christian and vice versa. Or even better there can be no mention of caste in any walk of life in the country, who ever talks about it will be jailed. Will such a measure makes any difference? It could, just like the laws that we currently have could. The basic problem will still remain people have to understand that all are equal, until then they will find ways to discriminate less fortunate people.
Now, to the current discussion - there are enough laws in India now to fight social injustice legally in court, that is power to people. All that needs to be done is again, "Educate" them properly. Now the practical problems, I believe most of the socially backward classes are also economically backward (forget about creamy layer for a sec - it won't be much anyway). So how do you get the children of those families to school while preserving the livelihood of the family? Governement/Society(meaning you and I) should do everything in our power to help them (you dont have to see if that family is a dalit family or a really poor Brahmin family). Like, providing books, clothes etc. (a lot of which are already being done by the gov.) but on the peoples part they should also make an effort to use those facilities and try to come upto speed and compete. Here comes the problem of "Free Buck", it is human tendency to become lazy and not do anything as long as we get something free. So, let everyone compete irrespective of the social belonging - for professional studies, for jobs etc. but provide them with everything possible for competing with "Fortunate" people. If a student competes and qualifies for higher/professional studies but is not able to pay up the fee - then there must be a provision under law which enables that student to goto college - provide subsidy in fee, provide a part time job which can assist the student or provide a loan that he/she can repay later. Make this a very smooth process so that the students are not distracted or discouraged by the Process.
One thing everyone MUST understand is that nobody can support a human being throught out his/her life, there has to be an effort made by the individual to be independent, self sufficient.
The point is - only a change is mindset of people about fellow humans can solve the problem of "Social Injustice", no other laws, reservations can do this. If any, these superficial measures will only widen the gulf between people, especially in these trying economic and global conditions no one would be willing to lose an advantage, whether it is fair or unfair. So, we have to go back to basic humanity and see why people are so desperate for success, security, power for which they willingly or unwillingly do things that they don't mean to.
