When a false statement gets repeated time and again, it acquires its own life. People stop questioning its veracity and start accepting that as the ultimate truth.
It was 1994. I was a Class 12 student at a Gujarati-medium state school in a village in Gujarat. My sociology teacher, whose last name was Patel, suddenly started talking about reservations. Until then, although my caste label was that of a Dalit, I did not know what reservations were.
He said that reservations were an unjust system meant to confer unfair advantages to scheduled castes and tribes. It was all a political gimmick aimed at harming the meritorious and more deserving castes in university admissions and government jobs. He also said that these reservations were introduced by BR Ambedkar, the architect of India’s Constitution, only for 10 years and they have never been abolished as intended. It was high time to do that, he said.
I was not the only Dalit student in the class. He was aware of our caste labels, but did not care how we might feel about his rant against reservations.
He thought Dalits lacked merit although I, a Dalit boy, was the best performing student at the school and he took pride in being my teacher.
I was reminded of this incident as I read an article by Tavleen Singh in The Indian Express on December 10 in which she wrote: “When reservations were introduced for scheduled castes and tribes in our Constitution, it was a vital gesture of atonement for the evil done to lower caste Indians for centuries. It was not just necessary affirmative action but something that had to be done for people deprived of the right to education and social equality, often in horrendous ways. But at the time that this affirmative action was introduced, Dr Ambedkar suggested that it should last only for ten years.”
It has been almost 30 years since the first time I heard about reservations. During these 30 years, I have heard so many times the call in different tones and languages for reservations to be abolished.
One thing that has also been repeated often is that Ambedkar was in favour of reservations only for 10 years.
That is blatantly untrue.
The initial time limit of 10 years was imposed only on reservations for scheduled castes and tribes being elected to state and central legislatures. No such restriction was introduced on reservations in education or government jobs.
Further, as shown in the below speech he delivered in the Constitutional Assembly, on August 25, 1949, he was not in favour of any time limit even on political reservations:
“I personally was prepared to press for a larger time, because I do feel that so far as the Scheduled Castes are concerned, they are not treated on the same footing as the other minorities...it would have been quite proper I think, and generous on the part of this House to have given the Scheduled Castes a longer term with regard to these reservations…For the Scheduled tribes I am prepared to give far longer time.
“But all those who have spoken about the reservations to the Scheduled Castes or to the Scheduled tribes have been so meticulous that the thing should end by 10 years. All I want to say to them in the words of Edmund Burke, is ‘Large empires and small minds go ill together’.”
Thus, often people have been attributing a wrong quote to Ambedkar to justify their demand that reservations for scheduled castes and tribes should come to an end.
When they demand the ending of reservations for scheduled castes and tribes, they do not provide any justification backed by statistics but a generalised argument that the reservations have been ineffective. Tavleen Singh has also similarly written: “As a tool for bringing social equality for scheduled castes and tribes, reservations have failed.”
She added: “If there is one section of Indians who has benefited most from reservations, it is our politicians…They have also learned the skill of using reservations in government schools and colleges to their own benefit by controlling who gets a reserved seat and who does not.”
The above statement does not make any sense, considering an education institution has no role in deciding who gets reservations and who does not. Reservations are fixed for scheduled castes and tribes under the executive orders that derive their power from the Indian Constitution. It is their constitutional right guaranteed under the equality code. A person gets the benefit of reservations only if they produce a caste or tribe certificate issued by the relevant government department. Thus, it is a completely independent system which an education institution is merely obliged to obey.
I am again reminded of the same teacher who thought merit was important. Yet, he did not want to carry out his job as expected of him. As I was the top performing student in my school, he once visited me at my house although I lived in a different village. He came to see me as he wanted me to do his job of evaluating the answers sheets of other students. He asked me to go to his home every day and evaluate the answer sheets in the annual examination of Class 12 students on his behalf.
When he visited our home, my father offered him water and tea. He refused to accept any of those as he was afraid of getting polluted as he believed us to be impure by our birth.
He did not have any problem in getting free labour from me and yet he thought reservations were the evil that harmed the so-called meritorious castes.
That is the crux of the matter when the so-called meritorious castes oppose reservations for scheduled castes and tribes. Their opposition to reservations is a proxy for their caste hatred towards scheduled castes and tribes.
On October 10, 1951, when Ambedkar resigned as law minister from the Indian government, he wrote: “The provisions made in the Constitution for safeguarding the position of the Scheduled Castes were not to my satisfaction. However, I accepted them for what they were worth, hoping that the government will show some determination to make them effective. What is the position of the Scheduled Castes today? So far as I see, it is the same as before. The same old tyranny, the same old oppression, the same old discrimination which existed before, exists now, and perhaps in a worst form.”
How much has the condition of scheduled castes improved even after 75 years of Indian independence? On what basis do the so-called meritorious castes oppose reservations for scheduled castes and tribes?
Rajesh Chavda is a corporate lawyer in the UK.