IMC SUPPORTS AFFIRMATIVE ACTION BUT NOT THROUGH THE FAILED ROUTE OF RESERVATIONS

Indian Merchants’ Chamber has made a strong representation to the HRD Minister on the issue of reservations in educational institutions.

The Chamber concedes that reservations, per se, are not new for India and the Indian economy. However, when introduced, these reservations were intended to be only a temporary measure- a measure to enable the poor and the down trodden to rise and gradually stand on their own feet. But unfortunately such kind of protection has now assumed permanent overtones.

The permanency, according to the Chamber, has been strengthened by the peculiar nature of party politics in India. The caste based politics that is so very dominant has made the caste card a vital factor in the battle of the ballot. Most parties therefore prefer to jump on to the caste bandwagon rather than take a firm or a reasonable stand on any issue. Therefore for reasons other than economic, reservations have continued for almost 60 years after independence.

The reservation issue has now once gain come back to the forefront with the Government considering reservations not just in the private corporate sector but in education as well

The Chamber unequivocally feels that in education as well as employment, merit and capability has to ultimately prevail.

Concept of reservation without reference to merit can only have a distorting effect and affect the social and moral fabric.

Besides, past experience has shown that the policy of reservations has not achieved dramatic results. For instance, half a century of job reservation in government services has created only a thin creamy layer of the backward castes who have benefited. Therefore, the Chamber feels that even if there are reservations in educational institutes the results will not be any different.

The Chamber also feels that the Supreme Court has taken a reasonable stance on the issue. On March 29 it stayed the Central law providing for 27 per cent reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in elite institutions like the IITs and IIMs and all Central universities.

The court held that the 1931 census could not be a decisive determinative factor to identify the OBCs for seat reservation However, it clarified that the benefit of reservation for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes could not be withheld and the Centre can go ahead with the identification process to determine the backward classes.

The bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan has now fixed May 8 to take up an application moved by the Union Government seeking early hearing on the constitutional validity of the law providing 27 per cent quota for the OBCs in elite educational institutions

In sum, the Chamber is all for ‘affirmative’ action, but certainly not through the failed route of reservations. It believes that a comprehensive and consensual view aimed at the uplift of disadvantaged section alone would resolve the issue once and for all.