My friends take on reservation issue and mine too.....

In connection with my earlier post, I forgot to mention the article that my friend had sent to me. So here it is along with my comments that is given in bold italics

Once upon a time in India there was an organization called Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, more popularly known as RSS. They had, in their hatred for Islam and Muslims, devised a plan to eliminate Islam from India. One of the part of this plan was to see to it that Muslims do not get any form of education, especially that which will help them in alleviating them from poverty.

In their attempt to keep Muslims away, they would ensure that Muslims never got education in colleges that imparted Medical, Engineering, and other such coveted fields of those times. This went on for about 40 years post independence. Then the change came. No, not from the RSS, but from Muslims themselves.

Around the early 1980s Muslims had realized and identified the source of their misery and decided to plan their way out. So with help of their like minded friends in Gulf, they started a financial drive to collect money. This money was then channeled in states that had a very strong secular groundings and whose politicians could be arm twisted in helping them out, even if RSS tried its best to stop them.

And so the stage was set. Not only were such colleges started but ensured that by way of facility they were the best and at par with the latest equipment for research in their fields. And right from the beginning it was ensured that they will be identified as Minority institutions. Lure for better salary packets ensured that the best faculty was available to them. Slowly but surely this within a span of two years, nearly four medical colleges were started. And as if to snub the RSS, what these Muslim colleges did was to buy out available resources for their colleges, like dead bodies in medical colleges etc at a very high premium. This trend was also emulated for engineering colleges and other coveted fields in other states.

With passage of time RSS attempts to keep Muslims away from higher education was neutralized.

By the way, RSS was instrumental in keeping away muslims from coveted the field of science. Great finding.. And you have gratuitously given the duration too. Well, in the 40 years of post independence, i.e. from 1948 to somewhere till 1988, Wasn't the "secular" congress government at the centre and state for this period, save for two years when the janata party had it's turn. How come that during this 38 year regime of congress, which in turn holds the legacies of minority spearheaders like jinnah and other "secular" leaders, the RSS could wield some clout over the education policies. Or was it that they physically tried the entering of muslims into those institutions?(!). Just weigh your words a bit before you spurt it out.


It is from this very example, The OBC and SC/STs should take a lesson. Its time for them to arm twist the government in starting educational institutions that will help them in overcoming the current reservation fiasco. Institutions that will be solely managed an operated by them and shall only enroll them. Not only this let the best brains in OBC and SC/STs strive to make this seats of learning to be at par with the best.


Now let me start the second take on the merit issue. What is Merit? Is Merit Character? Can merit ensure a Good Character? Has merit been able to be an advocate of Character? Not only this, if merit is the sole criterion then why do we have minimum pass mark, instead we should have a maximum pass mark, right?

I guess people making a huge cry over guaging education by merit, would have sometime in their life felt the pinch of not getting enough marks in some field or other. So it comes naturally of them to have a bitterness towards people who top it, which in turn manifests in the form of some hatred against them.
Well, leave it.. I might digress much..
So, why merit?. I think you can find the answer on your own. Just answer this question frankly devoid of any prejudices.
If in an unfortunate instance of you or your loved one facing an emergency surgery, which you know is a tight rope-walk between life and death, which one of the following doctors would you prefer, given you have only these two choices.
A doctor who had just the minimum pass mark in the subjects of medicine and being a quota beneficiary, consequently found his way to the medical profession. or
Another doc who is a gold medalist in his MBBS studies and found his way through solely due to MERIT?
Fair?..Your sincere answer will answer your question. And again if you could go on defending your stance by quoting instances of 'merit without character' etc. and other crap,Both of us know only too well that the arguments you are putting forward are just for the sake of it.
To remind you of something, you said that I am having some negative mentality. I wonder how a person with a sane mind could ever interpret mediocrity as a positive trait. If you are belonging to one of those prospective quota beneficiaries, just dont air your useless arguments for making us believe that it's a necessary thing for the future of our country. Accept the facts and just dont' blindly stick to your guns.



The logic behind a minimum pass mark is that, these amount of marks indicate that the person is qualified to go ahead in the next level of studies. Instead we have taken a complete contrary view. That only the highest mark getter is qualified, but then, that's defeating the very aim of minimum pass mark. And does academic brilliance mean that the person is capable to think laterally.


Even if one were to go by sheer meritocracy rule then Beethoven was not qualified to be a composer after twenty, because he had started loosing his ability to hear from the age of twenty [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beethoven ] and Einstein was not qualified for higher education, since failed in liberal arts [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein ]. Again as is well known, that The Prophet of the Prophets, Mohammed [SA] was an unlettered person. Does that mean that this people are to be treated as unqualified people.

Quoting einstein and beethoven you can't just generalize the whole student community. What if I put the examples numerous forward castes without adequate resources failing to make it into some college just coz of the limited seats put for them.. Mind you you will be beaten in your own game



As such I find this reservation debate, something like a circus. Sure merit is important, but then so do many other factors. The current votaries of merit should not forget that contemporary education, like physical sports, cosmetic [Plastic] surgery and Indipop music, are areas where even the most unqualified person can become an iconic figure, you just have to chisel them into one.


"No Reservation" policy can be applicable only when the resources available to every one is same. Not every hindi speaking person is a Prabash Joshi [Editor of Jansatta] who can speak English as fluently as Tim Sebastian [ex-BBC Hard Talk host]. And what I mean by this is that not every child's education is of the same standard that its counterparts are receiving, especially where the rural urban divide is concerned. Even in urban centres, Can the municipality education compare to the convents and private schools?

Then there lies the solution. "No reservation policy" is in all its sense applicable provided the empowering of the underprivileged, provision of required resources etc is guaranteed. Sheer pawning of seats worth it's weight in gold results in a suicidal effect for the country on a long run. You would do well to see how many of the 200 odd 'golden seats' in each IIM are being left vacant coz of the continous dropouts of students from the quota seats, obviously due to the inability to withstand the stiff competition. (for your info, IIM Calcutta witnessed 53 dropouts last year among which 41 was from the reservation category)Visualise a a 20000odd ranked guy entering an IIM through some quota competing with the top 20 ranked students in the same arena. Quota is a quick and wrong solution to a much graver problem. It just impairs the learning ability of the students at the same time increasing the hatred among the castes.



I think what Arjun Singh should have done is apart from the above mentioned solution of OBC and SC/STs having their own educational institutes, there should have been a reservation policy for municipality school educated children vis a vis private schools in every government supported institutions for higher education. This policy should also incorporate the declaration of every students family income to help the less privileged people in getting more and more support.

That's a welcome decision, may be. Establishment of minority institutions should be given a fillip. And the reservation of municipality educated students. You again provide the wrong solution. The best way out is to increase the quaility of education provided in the municipality/govt. schools. In a long run that would equip the students to face the competition from the private schools. Reservation of seats will stagnate the quality levels in the govt. schools as the notion "whatever be my performance i will get a seat" will utlimately send the public education's quality levels into a downward spiral. No one will ever bother to perform better and outpeform their peers in the private schools. Think twice, does reservation give a final solution or not.

Private Institutions are free to implement their own admission criterias and should be allowed a free hand in charging the fees. That should I think be the panacea to the circus called reservation.



Now for those people who are wondering which state governments in India were coerced in nullifying the RSS, its - Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.
well, as I said before a great work of fiction dude, and keep writing! Even though being from kerala, I never had known that RSS started it's operations in kerala 40 years ago! I thought it was the congress and communists that were ruling the state. Thanks for the gyan and your generosity. (It would be nice if you could shed light on why BJP, which as per your report, have done their best to stop the muslims from the eduaction field, is not incidentally able to grab a single seat in kerala assembly. Doesn't that reveal it's cloutlessness? And still you carry on with your arguments.blame game huh?)