I read through this article, and Iam of the opinion that jobs have to be based on merit. Historical wrongs do not justify prevention of job oppurtunities to the upper castes on the basis of reservation. Why should a rich individual who happens to be a dalit have access to free jobs and why should a poor Brahmin be discriminated against, just because his forefathers commited mistakes! Taking the US context does not present a true picture I would say. If reservations are spread on to the private sector, all that India is going to achieve, is to drive out even larger number of people abroad! The logic being, "I would rather be a second grade citizen abroad than in my own Country". I hope better sense prevails and financial support for education to all weak sections of society be provided to all Indian Citizens irrespective of Caste Creed and Colour.
[part 2 of 2]Studies after studies and reports after reports have shown that we still have a long way to go, and this article and the wokring US-model rightly points out that the dailts need to be supported not only in government jobs but in all avenues of growth, including private companies.
We need lot of such honest articles/research which show the true pictures and justify the affirmative actions. This will make people accept such actions in a better informed way. good article, thanks. -gautam.
[part 1 of 2 ] The Dalits in India are placed in a much worse situation. US is a developed country and the blacks are well aware of their rights because of the easily accessible technology/media. Due to this connectivity, in case of a violation of the law, the victim can easily seek justice by seeking support from the various support groups, or otherwise. Beacause of the rural nature of India, the dalits in India are isolated and hence cannot seek justice/support that easily. Affirmative action is the way to bring the deprived people level with other sections of the society. To some it may seem that the such actions have an adversary effect in term of money and/or quality but policy maker should think of the society in entirety and about the condition and aspirations of the deprived section. Only such measures can repair the damage for the suppression of ages and only by such measures the dalits can be brough level with the mainstream society and prevent their further alienation.
The author has made a strong case for affrimative action to tackle social inequality. The affrimative action measures have been very successful in the US. In South Africa, the experiment is however very new. Its progress is very slow. Its success so far is also not very impressive. However, the scio-economic structure in the US is fundamentally very different from that in India. Being a capitalist society, merits and efficiency do count it the US. Thus, the US type affirmative action was very successful there.
In India, our structure remains semi-feudal not only in villages, but in cities as well. The author has indeed noted that saying family lineage and inheritance matters more than merits.
Thus, in our situation, the Malaysian experience may be more useful. It may be noted that we have been providing job reservations to Dalits at least in government sector. But yet the impact is negligible. Thus, the Malaysian Bhumiputra policy that took a broad range of measures could be worth looking at. It has been very successful as well though there were some side effects. Government there is now looking at them and and also relaxing in areas where the objectives are achieved.
