The letter/email that I wrote to politicians/bureaucrats. Read it and share if you feel it is logical/rational/reasonable

Respected Sir,

This might not be the appropriate forum for this mail but I think that only a respectable person of your stature can help me in forwarding this to the people concerned. I will be extremely happy if you read this and share the deficiencies in the present system with the concerned people.

I am a student of school of management - IIT Bombay. I’ll be graduating in a week with a coveted degree from one of the most sought-after management institutes in the country to join a US based company in its Bangalore office. I also have an engineering degree from BITS Pilani, a few years of work experience with a South Korea based firm etc. My perseverance, intelligence and most importantly the emphasis laid on education by my parents and their willingness to do anything to make sure that I get a good education, have made me who I am today.

My parents did not inherit any wealth from their parents. They started from scratch. My mother brought me up telling stories about how she used to walk several miles on her way to school, in a remote village in Tamil Nadu without any footwear, how she never went to check her final exam results in school because by then the train ‘monthly pass’ would have expired and buying a ticket just to go and check the results was a costly affair for her. My mother was consistently a topper in her school and so her mother used to tell her that checking the result was immaterial as anyway she would have done well. My father used to tell me how he used to eat idli, which used to cost 25 paise instead of dosa which used to cost 30 paise to save on that 5 paise. He used to tell me how he used to walk some distance to skip a couple of bus stops so that he can board the bus in the ‘next stage’ and thus save some money. The only aim my mother had when she was in school was to do well in her SSLC exams, get a state rank and thus gain entry into posts & telegraphs (apparently there was a scheme then that if you score well in your SSLC you’ll be directly recruited in P&T) to start supporting her family(she had many siblings). That was her dream and she achieved it. She came 34th in the state, made her first and only job application and got a job. She continues to work till date, in what is known as BSNL today, for over 35 years. Because of my parents’ hard work and their frugal lifestyle, we have reached a stage where we can call ourselves ‘upper middle class’.

I am a Tamil Brahmin (Iyer). My parents never told me that some castes are inferior and some are superior. I never knew the castes of my friends and never cared to find out. I never knew which castes belonged to backward category, which belonged to scheduled castes/scheduled tribes until my final year of engineering. This was the time when I was first preparing for CAT and the government first came up with the proposal of introducing OBC reservation in IITs and IIMs and there was a protest with AIIMS as the epicentre. At that time, I was told that I was superior to many of my friends who were richer than me, who went to better schools than I did, who had better awareness and opportunities than I had. It was because they belonged to a certain caste which was an endorsement of their backwardness.

I got 98.46 percentile and 98.91 percentile in CAT 2007 and CAT 2008 respectively. But belonging to the general category, my score wasn't good enough to fetch me a seat in the IIMs. Fair enough. But I know of many instances where people who are very much like me in all respects (social, economic status) maybe even better than me have unduly benefited from reservation and got into IIMs and other such institutions of repute. Such blatant injustice breeds only anger and helplessness in people like me. I have not practised any discrimination of any form in my life. Why am I being penalised?

I am afraid that this system of caste-based reservation, apparently with the aim of uplifting the backward people and thus eliminating discrimination has had the reverse effect on me. I was made aware of the different castes and their purported backwardness only after this OBC reservation came into effect. Today I feel great about myself that I have done so well in life despite the system which has always been against me. I feel so proud that I managed to get a seat (though I did not take it up) in the ECE department of College of Engineering - Guindy (the most prestigious in Tamil Nadu) in a state which has 69% reservation, by securing 59th rank in the state-level entrance exam. And so I have great respect for people who have reached great heights purely based on merit, I admire people who have succeeded despite the system being against them. Thus the first question that comes to my mind when I look at a successful person is: Has the system unduly helped him in being successful? Naturally my respect for a person goes down greatly if I feel that he has received concessions which he did not deserve. So I’ll not miss an opportunity to tell anyone that I have come this far in life despite belonging to a so-called upper caste; I have achieved things in life purely based on merit. I’ll make sure that my son/daughter has his/her last name as ‘iyer’ because I would not want anyone to look at their success with suspicion! So this system of caste-based reservation has failed miserably in its purported intention of eliminating discrimination at least in my case.

Isn’t it striking that not a single caste has been excluded from the list of beneficiaries since the reservation policy was implemented but the number of castes entitled to the reservation benefits has gone up manifold since then? Does it mean that more and more castes are becoming backward year after year? It is really sad that people are fighting with each other to assert that they are more backward than the others! The ex-CJI Mr.K.G. Balakrishnan himself belongs to the scheduled caste. Does his son/daughter deserve reservation? Is there any logic in having reservation at the post-graduate level? Can a graduate be considered backward? When one has a bachelor’s degree, isn’t it perfectly reasonable to say that he is no longer backward? Has any effort been made in the last several decades to identify the people who have been uplifted from their backwardness and thus can no longer benefit from reservation?

I am not against reservation per se. But the fruits of reservation should ONLY go to the deserving people. NOT to the people who are already well off and have not suffered any discrimination whatsoever, not to the people who are nowhere close to a state which can be termed disadvantaged!!

I strongly feel that the vote-bank politics is seriously detrimental to the interests of the country in the long run. Some things that need to be done urgently are:

1.Revamping caste-based reservation and including economic status as a major criterion while determining backwardness. (Even SCs/STs should have creamy layer, for instance)
2.Periodically reviewing the list of beneficiaries to exclude people who can no longer be considered backward. Otherwise, an IAS officer’s son would benefit from reservation and gain entry into an IIM affecting the chances of not just people from the general category but of people who are still backward in his own community!
3.Targeting reservation and other instruments of social justice at the grassroots level (primary education) and excluding post graduation from the purview of reservation.
4.Strictly monitoring the issuance of such certificates(Currently, it’s not very difficult to get such certificates)

Finally I would like to end this mail with 2 sentences from Martin Luther King Jr's 'I have a dream' speech: "we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."

Regards
Krishna Prasad