What Mandal Really Wanted

The HRD ministry’s proposal to raise the reservation quota of students inthe professional institutions and central universities to 49.5 per cent from 22per cent has raised quite a clamour. But some important issues have been lost inthe debate. Nobody seems to be raising the basic issue: Why do we still require thecrutch of reservations to enable students from the deprived sections to stand ontheir feet even 60 years after Independence? What has happened to the tallclaims of affirmative action aimed at raising the educational and economicstandards of the SCs, STs and OBCs, so that their children are able to competeon their own merit? Arjun Singh’s proposal has been derisively described asMandal-II. As the Mandal Commission report is said to be the source of the ‘reservationsyndrome’, I as the former secretary of the Commission would like to point outhow unfair various governments have been to the Commission’s recommendations.

During its discussions the Commission was fully aware that reservations wereonly a palliative, and 27 per cent reservation in educational institutions andgovernment jobs was only one of several recommendations. Briefly, the otherimportant recommendations were: the radical alteration in production relationsthrough progressive land reforms; special educational facilities to upgrade thecultural environment of the students, with special emphasis on vocationaltraining; separate coaching facilities for students aspiring to enter technicaland professional institutions; creation of adequate facilities for improving theskills of village artisans; subsidised loans for setting up small-scaleindustries; the setting up of a separate chain of financial and technical bodiesto assist OBC entrepreneurs.

None of these measures were even casually examined by the government, andthen prime minister V.P. Singh adopted the facile and populist route of issuinga one-para order conferring the boon of 27 per cent reservation on OBCs. To thisday no serious effort has been made to lay the foundations of structures toenable the deprived classes which will compete with the non-reserved categorieson an equal footing.

While reservations to IITs, IIMs and AIIMS enabled SC, ST and OBC students toleapfrog their way into a prestigious institution, no attention was paid to thefact that this goal was reached only after 12 or 15 years of hard, foundationalwork in schools and colleges. And unless this foundation was adequatelystrengthened by building a sound coaching infrastructure for these students,they will find themselves at sea in professional colleges.

The short-term, myopic approach to social engineering has posed seriousproblems to the beneficiaries of reservations. A report prepared by two formerdirectors of IITs found that 50 per cent of seats reserved for SC and STcandidates remained vacant as the applicants failed to secure even the muchlower entry marks required. Of those admitted, 25 per cent were forced to quit,as they could not complete a four-year course even in six years. One IIMdirector said that they are able to fill only around 10-15 per cent of thereserved seats. And even those who are able to complete the course are not ableto take part in extracurricular activities owing to the pressure of studies.Most of them came away with bitter memories. And their travails do not endthere. They face their most frustrating hurdle in the job market.

If the Mandal Commission’s recommendations had been accepted and chainresidential institutes opened for OBC students aspiring to take up professionalcourses, they would have entered the IITs and IIMs with much greater confidenceand fared better. The need for reservations would, consequently, have graduallytapered off. But now, even after half a century of reservations, when the thirdgeneration of SC/ST candidates are entering these professional colleges, theirneed for a crutch is as acute as that of their predecessors, and the parents ofthose predecessors.

And its impact on society at large has been worse. The line dividing thereserved from the non-reserved categories, instead of blurring, has deepened,generating mutual hostility. Our politicians refuse to learn from history. Dosuch gimmicks really pay electoral dividends? How many times did V.P. Singh getre-elected after reserving 27 per cent berths for OBCs?

S.S. Gill was secretary, Mandal Commission.