Upper caste quota may open a Pandora’s Box

Upper caste quota may open a Pandora’s Box

FPJ BureauUpdated: Wednesday, May 29, 2019, 03:35 AM IST
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The Narendra Modi government has extended the olive branch to forward and upper castes by offering the economically weaker sections among them a 10 per cent quota. He has sought to meet their demand for reservations and at the same time, mitigate angst over the amendment to the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act last year. In so doing, he proposes to breach the 50 per cent cap on reservations set by the Supreme Court in 1992, thereby paving the way for state governments to follow suit. Is he opening a Pandora’s Box?

The move is aimed at mollifying the upper castes while countering the Opposition’s attempts to exploit the unrest over reservations among the Jats in Haryana, the Patels in Gujarat and Rajputs in Rajasthan. The fact that 49.5 per cent of central government jobs and seats in educational institutions are already reserved for SCs, STs and OBCs means the quota pie cannot be sliced any thinner; the only option is to increase the size of the pie. Thus, the government hopes to cross the 50 per cent rubicon.

As of now, Tamil Nadu is the only state permitted to implement quotas of 69 per cent, by the simple expedient of seeking the protection of the 9th Schedule of the Constitution. While the apex court has yet to take a final view on the legal validity of the move, other states have been attempting to do the same.

Telengana sought to hike its quotas to 62 per cent, while the Rajasthan government aimed for an ambitious 68 per cent. In 2014, Maharashtra sought a 21 per cent increase in quotas — 16 per cent for Marathas and 5 per cent for Muslims — but the Bombay High Court struck it down. In 2016, Haryana sought an additional 10 per cent quota for the Jats and five other communities and another 10 per cent for the economically backward, taking the total to 67 per cent. The Punjab & Haryana

HC stayed its implementation. Karnataka, too, attempted to breach the 50 per cent cap. The NDA government can bring a Constitution amendment Bill to bypass the court-mandated limit, but such a legislation will not be immune from judicial review. The Supreme Court has made it clear that the government has no power to tamper with the “basic structure” of the Constitution and this can apply even to the 9th Schedule, which is supposedly beyond judicial oversight.

What has prompted the Modi government to bring in such a drastic piece of legislation? Clearly, it is attempting a balancing act, seeking to accommodate the aspirations of various interest groups with an eye to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.  The August, 2018 amendment to the SC/ST Act was brought for the sole purpose of neutering a Supreme Court order setting aside draconian provisions in the original law. The RSS had anticipated an upper caste backlash as soon as the amendment Bill was passed. Feedback from the ground in Madhya Pradesh ahead of the assembly elections indicated that the BJP couldn’t take its upper caste votebank for granted.

Many of its supporters declaring that they couldn’t vote Congress, but wouldn’t vote BJP. RSS sarsanghchalak Mohan Rao Bhagwat, anticipating trouble, exhorted voters not to fritter away their franchise by pressing the NOTA button. As it turned out, NOTA did prove a spoiler for the BJP in 13 seats in the state, taking down four ministers.

Instituting an EWS quota for the forward castes underlines the manifest unfairness of the existing reservation system, which doesn’t recognize the creamy layer among SCs, STs and OBCs. The result is that the more privileged members of these communities corner the benefits of reservation, leaving out the bulk of those who actually need it.

Nor will there be an end to agitations, going by the experience of the last couple of decades. Quotas have been cornered by the more forward among the OBCs, impelling communities like the Gujjars in Rajasthan to demand ST status. Quotas within quotas have become the norm, as in Bihar, in order to accommodate EBCs and MBCs. The reservation for upper castes, which comprise a whole host of interest groups, will follow the same trajectory. Multiple sets of ‘rights’ make a wrong.

Bhavdeep Kang is a senior journalist with 35 years of experience in working with major newspapers and magazines. She is now an independent writer and author.

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