Elections and caste consciousness

The political theory of representation in competitive electoral political democracy has moved away from Locke or Mill to the present because democratic politics has thrown a challenge from marginal groups; equality based on universal adult franchise has completely failed to ease the problem of non-representation of the historically disadvantaged groups in Parliament and legislative assemblies.

How does the theory respond to the problem of disadvantaged groups in society?

The grand Indian experiment of marriage between universal adult franchise and reservations for special disadvantaged groups has attracted the attention of many scholars, including Alistair McMillan, who very successfully presents the reality of electoral representations of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes in India on the basis of reservation of seats in Parliament and state assemblies.

McMillan, while examining the problem of democratic representation, affirms that "the Indian practice of electoral reservation can clearly be justified under the approach taken by the proponents of group representation.

Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have been associated with persistent political exclusions, and members of each could argue that there was historical discrimination that perpetuated a separate identity subject to discrimination from non-group members".

After stating the positive need for reservations, he divides his study in two parts.

Part I, "Electoral Reservation in Colonial India", provides a historical context. Part II is devoted to SCs and STs in modern politics.

McMillan narrates the evolution of the idea of reservations through the battles fought among Gandhi, Ambedkar, and the British colonisers.

The Ramsay McDonald Award, the Gandhi-Irwin Pact, and the Gandhi versus Ambedkar debate at the Round Table Conferences of the early 1930s clearly show that "reservations for the Scheduled Castes and other minority communities during the colonial period along with anti-colonial struggles for Independence got tied down with suspicions of the nationalist leaders with the real intentions of the colonisers who were practitioners of 'the policy of divide and rule'."

Ambedkar found himself against Gandhian leadership because Gandhi always suspected that the colonisers were talking of reservations for the SCs to divide and weaken the anti-colonial nationalist struggle.

The two chapters devoted to the detailed events of the colonial period and the Gandhi-Ambedkar responses to the question of reservation for the SCs clearly show that it is absurd to maintain the thesis of Gandhi versus Ambedkar on reservations for the SCs. Gandhi and Ambedkar were both supporters of reservations for the SCs but had different perspectives on their understanding of their own roles in politics during the colonial era.

The author sums up: "Ambedkar and Gandhi argued for the political framework that would best suit the sort of party they sought to lead: for Ambedkar a party with a support base rooted in the untouchable communities; for Gandhi a party which could appeal across social divisions. The British ... were hardly impartial judges of the merits of each case."

What has been achieved during the past 55 years of SC-ST representation in electoral politics? First, the social mobility of these marginalised groups or achievements in the levels of education have changed and improved very gradually.

The author says "this illustrates the way in which the opportunities for Scheduled Caste development are restricted as much by their economic situation, as by caste-related disadvantage".

In spite of educational reservations, the SCs and STs have not been able to catch up with the levels of attainment amongst other social groups.

The author tells us that "broad social strategies, such as religious conversion, urbanisation, or job reservation programmes have only affected a very small proportion of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe societies and appear to have very limited impact on relative socio-economic status".

The chapter "Reserved Constituencies" gives in detail the manipulation of the delimitation process: "The delimitation process can be seen to have important political and sociological influences on the composition of reserved constituencies," and "how weakly the process of reservation is connected to any coherent concept of representation".

Has the voters' consciousness changed among the SCs and STs due to regular competitive elections during the last 55 years? Since the chapter on voters' turnout is based on the data collected by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi, it is now well-known that the "poor" are active during elections.

The chapter is important and the author should have gone much beyond the CSDS survey because this survey has attracted mixed academic remarks.

Another important chapter, "The Politics of Electoral Reservations", ends on a pessimistic note: "[W]hilst much of the justification for electoral reservation revolves around the need for otherwise marginalised groups to have a voice within the legislature, there is little systematic evidence that the representatives elected from reserved seats have performed this role with any effectiveness."

How could the author answer such an important question without interviews with SCs in the Lok Sabha or state assemblies? What have been the political consequences of reservations?

The first and foremost impact of electoral reservations is that the number of MPs and MLAs in India has become sizable and recognisable.

While political parties claim to speak authentically on behalf of the Dalits, "parties with minimum support bases amongst the Scheduled Castes/Schedule Tribes have still managed to win reserved seats, illustrated most starkly by the performance of the BJP in reserved seats in Uttar Pradesh ..."

The real message of the book is that electoral reservations have achieved some "necessary" but not "sufficient" conditions to bring the Dalits in centre stage and that "gradualism" is the watchword of the Indian democratic Constitution.

And the real flaw of this study is that it has no solid research to establish any relevant relation between the elected STs and SCs and their commitment to the genuine causes of the deprived communities.

It's not the Constitution that has failed us; the poor Dalits are not on the agenda of their leaders.

Standing at the Margins

Alistair McMillan
Oxford University Press
Price: Rs 625;
Pages: 340