Reservations, Political parties and Politicians

Opposition parties are there to oppose. Period. It does not matter where the policy is good or bad. Their duty is to oppose whatever is proposed by the government.

But, those rules can be broken in exceptional cases. What are the exceptional cases? If there is a proposal which can collapse the country, economy or development, then all the parties unanimously agree to that proposal, and they will collapse the country/economy/development. Reservations is one good example. When Arjun Singh introduced reservations for OBCs, except a couple of BJP MPs, nobody opposed it. Many regional opposition party leaders appreciated Arjun Singh publicly for that. If we have those kind of people ruling our country, it is very difficult to see Secular India where everybody is equal.

Thank God! Jews are not born in India

There were 750 Nobel prizes were given out between 1901 and 2007. 162 Nobel Prize winners were jews, and they comprise more than 20% of all the winners. But, Jews population comprise only 0.2% of the world population.

If Jews were born only in India, then what would have happened? These politicians would have brought a new system, where there will not be any Open category, and each caste/religion will get the corresponding quota depending on their population. So, Jews get 0.2% reservations in everything, and they have to compete in that 0.2% quota only.

I am not sarcastic in saying this. I am very optimistic that it could have happened based on my readings about politicians in the last 20 years.

Till 1989, the total reservations quota was around 22.5%. But, now, it is much more than 66%. In the last 20 years, the politicians increased the reservations by 2.5 times. I am sure Ambedkar did not expect this.

One problem with this sensitive issue is, once they are introduced, it is very difficult to reduce the reservation quota. If anybody abolishes the reservations, then there are so many idiots who are going to stop the entire state/country. (when I say idiots, I am talking about the people who are ready for riots, and all other illegal activities for each and every small thing.)

People like V.P.Singh, Arjun Singh, and Y.S.Rajasekhar Reddy introduce more and more reservations. But, unfortunately there is nobody who can reduce/abolish the reservations. Because, if anybody reduces or cancels the reservations, then they fear that there will be so many riots in the country/state, and they will lose the votes of the people from that community.

Because of that, reservations are increasing, and there is no chance of decreasing. However there are few good politicians who are against reservations.

Rajiv Gandhi

When V.P.Singh introduced reservations for OBCs, Rajiv Gandhi was the first person to oppose that. On 6th September 2000, Rajiv Gandhi gave one of the longest speeches in the parliament for more than two and half hours against reservations.

Kanshi Ram

In Mid 90's, Kanshi Ram publicly said that it was time to cancel all the reservations. But, the successors of Kanshi Ram act against his principles and they use his name for that.

L.K.Advani

Eventhough L.K.Advani do not like reservations, he cannot say that publicly, because of several reasons. When he was Home Minister, he took everyone in his ministry only on the merit basis.

Jaya Prakash Narayana

Jaya Prakash Narayana was an IAS officer, founder of Lok Satta and a great leader of Andhra Pradesh. He is completely against reservations. In his manifesto for the next elections, he came up with a new plan. In that, instead of the reservations, 10% of marks would be added to SC/STs. It is a very good idea, when we cannot abolish all the reservations. With this approach, SC/STs who get 35% marks will not compete with the people who get 50% marks. However, now they are competing with people who get more than 80% marks.