Reservations in educational system

Outline:

• Introduction
• Need for reservation in the past
• Current scenario
• Solution

The term “Reservation” has been doing the rounds within the Indian media circuit of late owing to the government decision to implement 27% quota for the OBCs in the educational institutions of higher learning. 

When our country achieved independence, a large section of the society was leading a miserable life. They had been exploited for ages and the false beliefs in the society at that time further worsened their condition. The government of that day introduced the concept of reservations so that there would be equal progress of all sections of the society. Over the years, the condition of the people of reserved categories has improved at a fast rate while that of the middle class, general or open category people has remained more or less the same. At a time like this, the government’s decision to bring out legislation to implement a 27% quota for OBCs adds further fuel to the fire.

Currently, as per the government policy, 15% of the students admitted to universities must be scheduled castes and for the scheduled tribes there is a reservation of about 7.5%. Other than this, the state governments also follow their own reservation policies respectively based upon the population constitution of each state. So nearly 50% seats are reserved. The general category people are being subjugated with only 50% of the seats.

Today when a student applies for an admission in any university, the admission forms are filled with questions like ‘Are you SC/ST or OBC or General Category?’ How does it matter which category does he belong to, what matters is his merit. A category cannot decide whether he is eligible for admission or not. There many economically worse off children belonging to the forward classes but they cannot get the fruits of such reservation merely by virtue of belonging to the ‘general’ category. Sometimes these children belonging to the backward classes do not even deserve and still possess the necessary merit as against a child who studied very hard for months to get a seat, thereby snatching away that seat just because he comes from a particular religion or caste for which our government provides reservation.

Reservations are nothing but means to prosper the vote banks of politicians. They are hindering the country’s growth, development and competency in all aspects. Reservation is creating disparity and differences amongst the people. By reserving one category against another creates a feeling of division which is now resulting in a chaos with every small section of the society asking for it.

However, reservation for women at university and school level is the one thing that is in order. Recently, in papers there was a case that a girl belonging to the rural area committed suicide because her parents did not let her pursue for higher studies even after good score in the boards. And this is just one case there are a lot of girls in India who are forced to leave there schools and get married. Giving reservations to women encourages not only the children to study hard but also the parents to send there children for higher studies.

Also I think reservations should be made on the basis of economical conditions. The kind of reservation policy that our government follows does nothing but divide the society.

"The reservation system only divides the society leading to discrimination and conflicts between different sections. It is oppressive and does not find its basis in casteism."

There are simple solutions to this like making education mandatory till age 15 and providing facilities for education for all at early ages rather than university levels.  Admissions at university levels should strictly be on the basis of credit and not reservation. Even at university level they should provisions for economically backward sections only. Exceptions should be made for women.