No room for reason

The Supreme Court's ruling on the government initiative to reserve 27 per cent of the seats in institutions of higher learning for the 'other backward castes' (OBCs) has met with the expected intemperate response from political parties. While in Tamil Nadu the ruling DMK has organised a 'bandh' against the judgement (and various courts have frowned on 'bandhs' too, since they disrupt everyday life!), there have been protests in other places as well by representatives of OBCs, who seem to think that they have been deprived by an insensitive court. But all that the court has asked for is an explanation for the basis on which 27 per cent of the seats are sought to be reserved. Since the last census of castes in India was in 1931, 76 years ago, no one really has any idea of the number of OBCs in the country. Arguably, though, even if it is not 52 per cent as the Mandal Commission conjectured somewhat questionably in 1980, and is only half that, a reservation ceiling of 27 per cent or thereabouts would seem justified "" provided you can establish that the OBCs have in fact been discriminated against, and the policy objectives are clear.

There is one group which says the purpose of reservations for the OBCs is identical to their purpose for the dalits and tribals, namely, their political empowerment, economic upliftment and the undoing of historical wrongs. This assumes that the OBCs have been victims in the same way as the dalits; nothing could be further from the truth. Another group says it is to create a middle class. But a well-defined middle class, in economic terms, already exists amongst the OBCs. A third group says it is to create vote banks, which is obvious.

Naturally, these multiple objectives have attracted multiple objections which do not have a one-to-one mapping with each other. The result is a lot of talk at cross-purposes, so that the good gets thrown out with the bad or, what is even worse, a lot of bad gets in with some good. The crudeness of the policy is to blame for this. In a sense, the Supreme Court is only asking that it be made less crude, for example, by targeting the poor amongst the OBCs rather than allowing the rich amongst them to corner the spoils and by at least getting an idea of how many people really belong to the OBCs. However, it is worth bearing in mind that if the next census were to do a caste-wise headcount, the perverse incentives that are being created may cause the ranks of the OBCs to swell miraculously!

The real problem is that the genie has been let out of the bottle and no one can put it back. No political party can afford to not support the OBC cause, and so there is no room any more for reasoned argument or the exploring of alternatives to reservation""like expanding the number of seats so that scarcity is addressed and there is no need for reservation any more. All that can be hoped for is that the government will be sensible and not seek confrontation with the court. What the country does not need is the kind of statement made by V P Singh, who said that "It is not just a matter of the Constitution but also democracy... It is unfortunate that we do not have the provision for a referendum." Singh should refrain from posing such false choices because they have the potential to get out of hand.