Opinion

Jobs On Payment

Social scientists have little hesitation in acknowledging that reservation has been used in UP as a political tool — not a social or economic tool.

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Jobs On Payment
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India's most populous state, Uttar Pradesh is a classic example of the failure of the reservation policy in ensuring true socio-economic upliftment of the targeted beneficiaries. Be it the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes or the OBCs, the benefit of reservation has been largely confined to a limited group within these communities. Social scientists have little hesitation in acknowledging that reservation has been used in Uttar Pradesh as a political tool — not a social or economic tool.

The benefits have remained confined, they say, to the same lineage — generation after generation and those at the bottom of the rung continue to remain there because of the unequal competition they face from the privileged lot within their own community. 

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"Take the case of a scheduled caste family whose member manages to succeed in the civil services examination ; now his next generation remains in a far more privileged position than that member of the community who was down in the economic ladder . While one receives elite education, gets all the comforts and luxuries of life and has far more exposure in life, the other finds it difficult to compete with him on any count — social, economical and educational — thereby leaving very little scope for him to rise in life", points out Brij Lal, a retired IPS officer , who had made it to the elite service on general merit , despite belonging to the scheduled caste. 

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Arvind Mohan, Professor of Economics at Lucknow University feels that the reservation policy has had little to do with development. "Since the reservation policy was closely linked to politics, it has failed to go hand in hand with economic growth", he points out.

According to him, there has been a steady decline in job creation in UP between the 1970s and 2010. "A study has shown that in 1970 , every 1 per cent growth was responsible for generating .4 per cent employment , which diminished to .2 per cent in 2010", he said . 

The reason for such "jobless growth" is not far to seek. "Far from pushing the labour intensive industry, the emphasis of successive governments has been on capital intensive industry, with the result that the number of jobs have not grown in proportion to the rise in the population of educated youth", Mohan points out.

No wonder therefore, as many as 4 crore persons were available for less than 2 lakh jobs that were promised by the Akhilesh Yadav government in the state. And there too, the common apprehension was that merit would be the first thing to be compromised for pecuniary gains. "Already there were middle-men floating all over the place demanding anything ranging between Rs 2 lakhs to Rs 5 lakhs for a Class IV position in different government departments or as a police constable", alleged a young applicant for a Lekhpal's (erstwhile 'patwari') job in the state revenue department.

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Asked why he does not make a complaint to the authorities, he shot back, "Complain ? To whom ? It is those very people sitting in positions of power who are actually selling the jobs ; I belong to one of the reserved categories , but it seems quite evident that even amongst us, jobs will go only to those who can either shell out money or have some clout with the powers that be." 

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow.

This article is a web exclusive and does not appear in the print version of the magazine.

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