Reservation in India with Respect to Education

“Manmohan Singh - We are sending Indians to the moon next year...
Obama - Oh! How many???
PM - 100...
35 OBC, 25 SC, 20 ST, 10 handicapped, 5 sports quota, 4 minority & if possible....1 astronaut”

I received this joke a few years back and it sometimes does make me think is reservation a necessity or mere vote bank politics. Till date we have not had a consensus on the same. With the Patel’s raising their demand for reservation in Gujarat it makes me wonder is reservation a mere political thrust or does it have more to it. Since education is the backbone of a person’s well being I decided to look at reservation in the field of education and its impact. The main focus of this article would be on the IITs as it is one of India’s premium education and is one of the best amongst the world. This article deals with the scenario India is in and argues both sides of the topic and in the end puts forward a conclusion with suggestions which need to be thought of as this is a very sensitive topic.  

India is one of the few countries that practices affirmative action on a large scale. B. R. Ambedkar, the Minister of Law in the Interim Government, and a leader who drafted of the Indian constitution, he made provisions for reservations for Scheduled Castes (previously termed 'untouchables') in government run institutions in the 1950s.

The IITs had initially implemented a quota system, but the quota system was scrapped and the modified scheme described below was introduced in 1983. This procedure was evolved based on the experience of implementing a quota system for ten years (1973–1983). The logic cited for this procedure is that IITs being Institutes of National Importance, there should not be any compromise on the quality of students studying in them; accordingly, students admitted through the reserved quota have no relaxation in requirements for passing courses or getting the degree. They are, however, allowed to complete the program at a slower pace (take longer to get the degree).

Currently, reservation of 15%, 7.5% and 27% seats is provided for candidates hailing from SC, ST and OBC communities. In case enough candidates do not meet minimum qualifying criteria as per written tests, SC/ST candidates are permitted a relaxation of 50%. If some vacancies still exists, a further relaxation is offered with a deferred admission after 1 year of Preparatory Course study covering physics, chemistry and mathematics. After one year of study, only those candidates who are able to clear a cut-off in the End Semester Exams are allowed into regular studies at the IITs. The seats reserved for SC/ST students are not transferable to General Category and roll on to the next year's students from the Preparatory Courses.

HISTORY

In the year 2005, based on the recommendations of an independent panel, the UPA government at the centre proposed to implement quota system for Scheduled caste, Schedule tribe, Other Backward Classes and minority communities in IITs and IIMs (for both students and faculty). To pave way for such reservation scheme, the Constitution of India was amended (the 93rd Constitutional Amendment, originally drafted as 104th Amendment Bill). In 2006, the UPA government promised to implement 27% reservation for OBCs in institutes of higher education (twenty central universities, the IITs, IIMs and AIIMS) after 2006 Assembly elections. This, if implemented, would reduce the seats for the general section of the population to less than 50.5% (since those for whom the quota is granted can compete with the general section also on merit).

This led to sharp reactions from the student communities in the institute’s concerned and also substantial opposition from students of other colleges as well. Students gathered under the banner of "Youth for Equality" and demanded that the government roll back its decision to grant more reservations.

In addition to complete roll-back of the proposed reservation, the striking protesters have demanded that an expert committee comprising members from non-political organisations to review the existing reservation policy and find out whether reservation for OBCs is required at all. This is based on the current confusion over actual population of OBC as various organisations have indicated various figures for the population of OBCs. This is mostly because the 1931 national census was the last time detailed population and economic data was gathered along with caste information for the OBC population.

On 29 March 2007, the Supreme Court of India, as an interim measure, stayed the law providing for 27 percent reservation for Other Backward Classes in educational institutions like IITs and IIMs. The Court held that the 1931 census could not be a determinative factor for identifying the OBCs for the purpose of providing reservation. The Supreme Court also observed, "Reservation cannot be permanent and appear to perpetuate backwardness".

On 10 April 2008, the Supreme Court of India upheld the law that provides for 27% reservation for Other Backward Castes (OBCs) in educational institutions supported by the Central government, while ruling that the creamy layer among the OBCs should be excluded from the quota

Against Reservation

The main argument against the concept of reservation is that it goes against the idea of merit and would dilute the IITs as one of the basic reasons behind their success is the excellent students they get via IIT-JEE. It is also being argued by the opposers that the irreparable damage caused during the childhood of the individual, cannot be rectified at a later stage. Also, the primary education provided by the government to the economically poor is highly inadequate, and this negligence by the government is the root cause of the problem. Statistics across the IIT's reveal that while about 4–5% of general category students do not complete their degree program, the number goes up to about 20% for reserved category students. This is used as an argument against reservations claiming that the reserved class candidates are not adequately prepared to face the challenging academic life in IITs.

The argument of centuries of social injustice through the caste system (see below, in the next Section) is not accepted by those who point out that the caste system, although differently known and practised in different societies, is a tribal hangover from the past, which had some merit in that it ensured, or 'reserved', specified jobs to be done castes which had a preference to do so. They have no sanction in the Vedas (the Upanishads Section) in which only speak of four broad 'Varnas' or divisions according to the temperament of people and of inter-Varna switch, or mobility, based on individual efforts when he/she happens to be borne to a man of a particular Varna. This process, called 'Samskara' is, approximately, conscious individual refinement. In a true sense, therefore, the talk of deliberate subjugation of or discrimination of upper castes against lower castes has no basis, even though distortions of the principle has happened historically, without sanction of the Vedas. Hence reservation, the anti-reservationists seem to say, is just a mask for demanding reservations under the cloak of casteism over-riding merit and blissfully ignoring that Vedas do not sanction this. At any rate, after several decades of Varna reservation for the lowest social strata comprising certain classes constitutionally enshrined as 'scheduled castes' and 'scheduled tribes', and otherwise open competition to all people irrespective of any criteria other than merit and aptitude, there is no justification for the political parties to demand extend reservation of educational admission and job opportunities to more classes ('other backward castes').

It is pointed out that more opportunities in keeping with the uncontrolled growth in population, in all spheres of economic activity as well as education, will be the only right answer and not reservation. However, since proportional representation is the basis of modern democracy as it is practised, these anti-reservationists point out, this, in India, has led to its most abominable abuse, resulting in a democracy which is of and by Indians but against their own interests, since a disunited country oblivious of equality of opportunity because of prohibitive reservation levels, can never compete successfully in the global context, nor achieve much in its own management of internal economy.

The abuse of political power to demand reservation for all other than the so-called 'forward ' communities is, according to the contesters, just a vote bank politics to woo the majority represented by the beneficiary communities to cast their votes in their favour. Since, however, there are no opponents among political parties to educational and job reservations, in view of their universal vote bank politics, such reservation in themselves cannot favour any particular parties at the elections.

In response to the government's assurances that seats will be increased in the institutes so that the general category students don't get affected, another point raised against reservation is that most of the seats reserved for SC/ST candidates remain empty and hence any more reservation is a waste of resources. A major concern among them is also the fact that implementing reservation in institutes of higher education would be difficult unless the quality of faculty in them is diluted. They back this point by the fact that all IITs and IIMs are facing shortage of faculty and hence increasing the seats will lead to deterioration of education.

For Reservation

The most important argument in favour of reservation is basically economic in nature. If there is discrimination and exclusion prevailing in any of the institutions, whether industry, educational institutions, it has a negative impact on the economic growth. In the absence of equal opportunity, a sizeable section of the society remains either unemployed or underemployed. The burden will be taken by a minuscule economic agents accessing opportunity to the mentioned institutions. Reservation as a form of positive discrimination should be welcomed for the national interest. But this shouldn't mean reducing the opportunity for the general categories. Government should try to accommodate all by creating more number of educational institutions. Some people consider the additional procedures for admission into the IITs as unnecessary and counter-productive. The opposition to the policy of reservation (through the preparatory course), and favouring direct admission is based on the following arguments:

In the past, a large number of seats remained vacant. According to some estimates, only 10% of SC/ST seats were filled due to lack of qualified candidates. However, since 2010 hardly any reserved seats are left unfilled as enough candidates qualify on merit.

Candidates who did not have the basic minimum marks but were on the borderline were offered admission after spending on year studying preparatory course. They wasted a year as well as felt traumatised due to this preparatory course. In 2012, for the first time there was no need to have a preparatory batch since enough candidates qualified within the reduced parameters.

On the philosophy behind the process of reservation itself, the people in favour of reservation feel that reservation is necessary to undo and counter the 'evils' of centuries of caste system that prevailed in the country. Reservation proponents also contend that merit as it is defined today is something that is achieved with the help of cramming, tutoring, constant guidance, quality schooling and knowledge of English and poor Dalits, poor MBC's lack most of these.

Conclusion

Before I put forward my views here is a recent article which needs to be read before we draw a conclusion from the same.

In IITs, qualifying score goes down so that ST student count can go up

Hemali Chhapia,TNN | Jun 13, 2015, 06.51 AM IST

MUMBAI: A shortfall in the count of scheduled tribe students has forced the Indian Institutes of Technology to re-engineer the qualifying score to join the tech colleges. The aggregate marks are down from 177 (35%) to 124 or 24.5% of 504. Similarly, the cut-offs for each subject have been revised from 10% to 7%. Downsizing of qualifying marks has taken place across the board. The minimum percentage of marks in each subject is 6.30 for OBC students and 3.5 for SC/ST candidates.

For the first time, ever since the Joint Entrance Exam has been redesigned as a two-tier qualifying test, the minimum cut-off score has been reduced by 30 per cent. Only those students who score the minimum required marks for both aggregate cut-off list and subject wise cut-off will make it to the rank list. With this revision, the IITs have now managed to push in a few more ST candidates than the total seats reserved for them, thus working to ensure that not many slots go unfilled.

"There weren't enough ST students who had qualified. Although we now have more ST students than the seats, not everyone may take admission. They may not be happy with the IIT or the stream allotted. But we surely now have enough ST candidates who have qualified this year," said a JEE chairman.

On June 3, the tech schools had declared a higher cut-off. But on Friday evening, they had a change of heart and the downgrade took place after compiling the performance of all candidates. Authorities realized that there weren't as many students who made the cut. There are 10,006 seats across the IITs this year; there are 750 seats for ST candidates.

"We have revised the marks based on the performance of all those who took the JEE (advanced)," said the organizing chairman of JEE 2015. Last week, the IITs had uploaded the scanned copies of the ORS answer booklet and 150 candidates had challenged their scores. On Saturday, the IITs will upload the fresh scores, before declaring the result on June 25.

The above article mentions that the IITs would be reducing the percentage of merit for ST students to occupy the empty seats. Doesn’t it mean that the quality and level of education is being compromised just because the seats are being left empty. Cant the empty seats be opened to the general quota so that the quality is not compromised. More than 1 lakh students appear the IIT JEE and a mere 6000 of them qualify. If you see the stats it means only 6% of the total people appearing actually get the admission. Is it fair to people who do not belong to any quota.

On what basis is the percentage of quota being determined. As stated earlier the quota percentage had been derived on the census data of 1931. Majority of who would not even be alive in today’s date. We need to rethink on the proportions as a only 50.5% of the seats are open for the general class where as there are more deserving candidates. Few years back the IIT also had an NRI quota of 2% but that was removed as the level of students were not upto the mark. If such a step can be taken for another quota why can’t we rethink the same for the SC, ST, OBC quota as well. Politicians will always play their politics card but we as a nation will have to think in what direction we need to take our country.  

In a country like India we have to think about the economic backward class but at what cost. Are we ready to let go the best that we have. In fact the schooling education shall be strengthened first before we take such steps for our premium institutes. The schools which the people come from are of a low standard and opening doors for them in such highly regarded institutes is a risky sign. We boast about our IITs and IIMs but are they the same what it was a few years back. Is there a need to make them autonomous? Is too much political intervention hampering the quality and standard of education in India? We can have reservation for them but for that we need a complete new survey which justifies their population to the number of students admitting. By just lowering the standard would not be wise. If equality is to be maintained it needs to be justified on the basis and ground reality.

I am not against reservation but I feel there is a need to debate and question the basis of reservation. An SC/ST/OBC or any reservation category person can apply to a general quota as well but a general category person can never be admitted on a reserved seat. Don’t we need to think again and decide what steps are to be taken so that the general people do not suffer? If the level of candidates for the reserved seats is not upto mark then cant those extra seats open to the general quota instead of lowering the standard. Equality must be maintained but justice should prevail.