RESERVATION ISSUE IN INDIA
by
R.S.Ramaswamy
( rs.ramaswamy@gmail.com)
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The reservation issue
is relevant to students and budding developers in Software Industry,in India. As is well known, Indian software Industry
is growing at a fast pace and many International majors are out-sourcing to
Indian companies.Before we as Indians become euphoric about becoming
the topmost software nation of the world,it is better
to heed the fact that only such jobs
which are labour-intensive are being allotted to
India and real R&D jobs are still retained in US and the share of India in
International software market is a mere 3 per cent.The
US is a real software-based community where most of the industrial, administrative and even knowledge
activities are computer-oriented. It is estimated that about 70% of
American population is in one way or another involved in Information
Technology, either as end-user or developer.India is
nowhere near such a level of activity.Though a number
of Indian engineers have contributed significantly to the developments in the
computer field in US,it is
well to remember that it was the US environment that triggered their creativity
and gave them the opportunity. Vinodh Kosla of Delhi IIT was one of the founders of SUN
Microsystems. He is known as the man with Midas touch. Vinodh
Dham was the man behind Pentium in Intel. Mrs.Mala Chandra
of SUN is credited with expert management of the EJB committee and EJB still continues to be
Java's key strength(despite the 'spring-loaded' punch by Rod Johnson).Sometimes , one wonders if SUN
is an Indian company, going by the frequent occurence
of Indian names in its activities. SUN's
International R&D center is now in Bangalore(INDIA).Google is
attributed to his Indian Professor by its American inventor, though the
professor declines the honour and gives all credit to
his student! Hotmail is another
instance of Indian contribution.There may be many
more, without much publicity.However, Indian software
industry is growing not by catering to Internal demand but due to outsourcing by US
majors.
Indian Industrial
development needs a lot of foreign exchange and Indian software Industry plays
a crucial role in this aspect. Engineers who are fortunate to get into software
field have a unique opportunity to serve the nation and serving themselves too,
with a fat
salary ,without 'sacrificing' anything except their leisure time! Let us wish them well.Outsiders
just look at the paypacket enviously
, hardly knowing how gruelling the workload of
software professionals is.Hence, let us offer our
sympathies too , to Indian software professionals.
Does the Indian
Software Industry need
innovative genius or
disciplined skill-workers?
Both. But, which is more important
in the long run? Decidedly, innovative genius. Much of
the computer-drudgery work itself can be computerized. Model-driven
architecture and automation may make the coder of today, irrelevant tomorrow. Has
not such change occured in the field of textiles? match-works?Dairy
work? Even agriculture? Is it not the very essence of
Industrial Revolution? If computerization with SAP can re-engineer an industry ,can the same SAP not replace the major chunk of
such SAP workers tomorrow?
This is the inexorable law of Industrial development.Technology creates goods but in
the process, robs jobs. We get a situation of 'poverty amidst plenty'. The
solution cannot be simply arresting technolgy. The dilectics of development would one day resolve this contradiction by a political solution.This is the lesson of history.
In many of the present
service-oriented companies, the job of the project manager who gets the orders
and supervises the project execution with quality and efficiency has assumed
more importance than the job of coders, the argument being that without an order where is the
work for coders? Let us consider the Auto industry. Unless a brand name is made
successful by the marketing department, how can the factory get orders and
where is the need for workers?
That perhaps explains
the role of Management experts.The software growth in
India is due to their success in getting orders from US.
The industry is
entering the second phase now. Instead of getting outsourcing
jobs purely because of cost-saving, Indian software companies are now gradually
winning the confidence of International majors that we can execute mission-critical
jobs also which require high level of technological expertise
,competence and creativity. Any dilution of quality of manpower at this
crucial stage of our country's development will be a highly shortsighted move. In
no time, we can lose our market and all our dreams can
vanish in just one year. Software field is so volatile and demands ability to
cope up with fast-paced techology changes.
There are two aspects
in software work. The first aspect is vast knowledge and R&D ability which
requires innovative genius. It can be safely stated that students from IIT and
Institutions like BITS and IISc and also some
Regional Engineering colleges are a
class by themselves and they fulfil this role admirably.The cream of Indian students are in such
institutions. These Institutions have been able to maintain their high
standards thus far, mainly due to freedom from political pressures.
The second aspect is
skills-based. Innovative ability of R&D caliber is clearly different from skills.But, skills are hardly less important to the Industry.Most of the State-level Engineering colleges and
some colleges and Universities offering Computer-Science related courses belong
to this category.Many of the mushrooming deemed-Universities
may claim to be on par with IIT.But the quality of an
Institution is decided more by the quality of the students than by the infra-structure,
whatever be the glitter of these money-making capitation-fee education
factories which cater to the richer sections.
Let us not belitle our little geniuses
in IITs.
Without their innovative leadership, the routine jobs also will
vanish and everyone,including
the routine programmers, skilled workers and ultimately the entire nation will
be adversely affected.
The central issue now
is whether there should be caste-based reservation in Institutions of Higher
Learning like IIT.
Should not 'pure merit' be the only criterion of admission?
We are now entering
very sensitive area .We should tread softly as even angels fear to tread here. Whatever
be the yardstick of pure merit, it should be conceded that environment does
play a part. There are three types of
handicaps.
1) caste
and family background
2) economic
background
3) rural
vs. urban divide.
Let us consider the case
of a poor Dalit boy , whose
parents are landless agrarian labourers in a far off
village. Being a Harijan, he suffers from social
oppression. He is too poor to spend much on education. He lacks the proper
school and college environment.Most of the elementary
and middle schools in such Dalit areas are not
functioning atall. Many of these teachers there draw
their salary regularly and spend their time in nearby town attending to their
own business. ( The situation in many colleges and
universities may be no different perhaps?). With all these handicaps, can we
compare his performance with a boy or girl from an upper class household , whose parents are high officials in Delhi, and
who have been educated in the best of schools and colleges? Or with a Doon School product with his cronies in top echelons of
power centers?If the student
is a Dalit girl, one more handicap is added , that of
gender bias.
If ,
despite all these problems , there are Dalit students
who have made it to higher level education,let us
salute them ,for, they are extremely special and valuble
species, with tremendous fighting qualities.
The problem of children
from non-Dalit backward communities (OBC) is
slightly different. If Dalits are oppressed community,
OBC can be classified as Backward class only.
This backwardness is due to their rural occupation as agriculturists. Traditionally,
these agricultural families had not given much importance to education in pre-independence
days.Education in those days was meant to get a job
as a teacher or a government clerk and the rural gentry looked down upon these
jobs as unbecoming of them when they had their own land and farm, house and cattle.Who would go to town and suffer as a glorified paid
servant? Even today, merchant class families do not like salaried jobs.The IT revolution has made a change in that attitude
because the pay is so attractive even to them.
There is no social
handicap for OBC. There definitely is the problem due to rural residence.
In the case of poor peasants, they also suffer from poverty
.
Rich paeasants and landlords of OBC communities admit their children in costly public
schools and otherwise provide everything that money can purchase(including
seats..by capitation fees).Given
that environment, the students may end up scoring high percentage.
But not all OBC people
are living in rural areas. Many have shifted to business and reside in town and
are affluent. They too provide the best amenities to their wards.
Considering all these
factors, for the sake of providing level playing field, which our 'desi' business houses are always clamoring in the face of
foreign competition, some sort of 'Positive Discrimination' is essential
for the uplift of the weakest sections of our society.This
is what led to the framers of Indian Constitution to provide for Reservation
in education and government jobs for Dalits.It should be remembered that there
was absolutely no objection to this from anyone.
Though, there was no
social oppression of OBC , it cannot be denied that
the poor peasant households of OBC ,
were only very slightly better than the landless Dalits.
The fact that reservation for Dalits enabled a
few to become educated and become govt servants, engineers and even doctors , made the OBC
sections restive and soon there was a demand for similar reservation for OBC
also.
Nor can it be denied
that the poor among the rural OBC deserve such positive discrimination. But, the OBC
are not all rural, nor all poor. In fact there are fabulously rich OBC
households both in rural and urban areas.
But the
benefits of reservation for OBC in
southern states of India have gone to the
'creamy layer' of OBC
mostly. It is to prevent this that the Supreme Court enjoined the government to
carefully remove the
creamy layer of OBC from the beneficiaries of Mandal
commission recommendations.
What do we conclude
then?
1) Reservation in Education and government jobs is a must for Dalits.Social Justice demands it.
2) Similar reservation to
very poor OBC families also should be provided.But
it should be ensured that the richer among the OBC are excluded from such
benefits.
3) As stipulated by the Supreme Court, the total of reservattion should not exceed 50%.The unreserved secion should be
purely on merit.
4) Extremely poor students from forward communities may be given some reservation.
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These are general
principles. It is not desirable to apply these rules in Institutes of Higher Learning.Selection in such prestigeous
institutions should be purely on merit. Otherwise, the country suffers in the
long run. The correct remedy is to recruit only graduates ( either BA/BSC or B.E)in Institutes
of Higher Learning and R&D establishments.. Upto
graduate level, reservation should be strictly implemented, with due care to
exclude richer sections cornering the benefits. After graduation, there should
be no trace of reservation anywhere, in education.
By the time a Dalit or OBC student completes graduation, he is hopefully
mature enough to understand the openings available to him and attempt them. Forcing
such a difficult decision on a ten year old boy in a rural household is most
unjust. Only parents in
prosperous and educated families are at present able to guide
their children accordingly.
If the quality of our
leaders in software field falls, the entire field will collapse. It is in the
interest of the skillworkers to leave the field clear
to the scientists
instead of usurping a role that they cannot fulfil,
by unfair means of OBC quota.
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