Has Higher Education Failed India?

Ref jang #117

[abe harimau, do you think tamilnadu is worse-off as compared to other states who have less reservation than not? stick to real evidence here.]

Well, check out the statistics from the late 1960s to the early 1980s. What was Tamil Nadu`s economic progress compared to states like Punjab, Haryana, Maharashtra, or Gujarat? Even when the Government of India restricted foreign investment, why was it that Gujarat and Maharashtra prospered and Tamil Nadu was wallowing in (and still wallows in) crapola like declaring Tamil a Classical Language (does your local university offer courses in Tamil now that Tamil is officially a Classical Language?) or raising a statue to mythical Kannagi (who was an ardent supporter of Brahmin superiority if one is to believe the Tamil epic ``Silappathikaram``)?

[why is tamilnadu high on literacy, education and so much becoming detrit that hamidm and urstruly plan to move there?]

The seeds of the automobile industry were sown way back in the 1950s with Standard Motor opening its factory here and ancillary manufacturers opening up shops in industrial estates created by a forward-looking Industries Minister. (Incidentally, this was R. Venkataraman, a Brahmin, later the President of India.) The Masanamuthus of Tamil Nadu were famous for politicizing the trade union movement so that if the Communist-led union would settle a strike, then the DMK-led union would stage another strike to extort money from the company. That was the extent of their contribution to industrialization.

The only growth in employment has been in the government sector in Tamil Nadu until recently. Even during the recent election, the major issue was hiring even more employees for the state government who would only be there to rip off the public while spending time drinking coffee and reading rags such as ``Murasoli`` or ``Dinakaran`` (house organs of the DMK).

The ``mistake`` made in refusing brahmins government jobs was conceded by even EV Ramaswamy Naicker who lamented that what with the government jobs with fixed (and meager) salaries being denied them, the Brahmins had gone off into small-scale industries and made more money than before.

The other mistake that was made was the opening of innumerable number of private engineering and medical colleges. Brahmin parents who had become two-income families in the 1970s also limited their families to two children or less in order to provide a good future for their children. They were able to send their children to these private engineering or medical colleges and that is why you still see a good number of brahmins in the software engineering business. Of couse the Masanamuthus pretend they are as good as these hard-working people which was given the lie by a recent incident: when I asked a private university who the best undergraduate computer science students were, the Head of the Department paraded a bunch of students from Bihar but not a single Masanamuthu or Karuppayee from Tamil Nadu!

Even today, check out student populations at IITs, IISc, BITS-Pilani, etc., and see where the talented TamBrahms go for education.

PS. The current official reservation percentage in Tamil Nadu is 69%, higher than the Mandal mandate of 50%. In fact, there is a suit pending in the Supreme Court where the Tamil Nadu government (even under Jayalalitha) is arguing that Tamil Nadu can set its own admission quotas. The 69% quota is official but the real percentage is closer to 90% because if you don`t produce your SC/ST/OBC/MBC certificate, you will be assigned to a private engineering college with huge fees. I know of people who have had to ask for charity to support them at these schools.

In the 1960s, it would be a rare instance for a student to move the High Court to get relief when he could prove that the government violated its own policies in denying him admission. This would usually be a wealthy Brahmin; by the time he is admitted to medical college, it would be in the next year`s batch.

Last year, there were 30,000 engineering seats which were not filled. The number would be something similar this year. The Masanamuthus of Tamil Nadu have come up with a scheme to overcome this: the private engineering colleges ran their own admissions exams and set their own criteria for passing!

The government has gone one step further: they abolished the entrance exams altogether, though this was stayed by the High Court. Soon, you will have no exams in the universities but the day you pay four years of tuition, there will be a degree certificate with your name on it (pick from Masanamuthu, Tamil Selvan, Senthamizh Selvi, Karuppaayee, Love King, Love Queen, Love Jewel; others would take a special request and extra time).

PPS. The worst thing is that the Masanamuthus have started naming their daughters Sujata. Let us get one thing very clear: you guys do not belong to a good (su) `jati` so you have no right to such a name. Call them ``Panchavarnam``, meaning the Fifth Varna. That would be appropriate.

Ref pmishra2 #123

[#119 moron-guru

SO now you are back with your bakwaas. You think we dont know the ugly left-wing politics of Shri N. Ram and Khare at the Hindu? We are all aware of their respect for Stalin, Mao, all communist dictatorships, Saddam Hussein.]

Two days ago, there was this headline in ``The Anti-Hindu``. It said ``Dam Topped Off``. One would think that this meant the Narmada Dam has been completed. No, it was the Three Gorges Dam in China that has been completed. Similarly, a week ago, there was a news item about the successful trial run of a mag-lev train. It was also in China.

Chinese accomplishments -- at the cost of millions of lives and livelihoods -- are touted by this left-wing rag while India is consistently derided.

From http://www.irn.org/programs/threeg/resettle.html

[One fundamental problem in assessing the Three Gorges resettlement program is that the official figures appear to be false, and the success stories fabricated. For example, four Sichuan journalists who are assigned to report full–time on the progress of resettlement told me that county officials in Sichuan and Hubei claimed at a conference in January that 200,000 people had already been resettled. If accurate, that number would mean that resettlement was ahead of schedule. But the journalists explained the 200,000 figure was an exaggeration by local officials wishing to impress their superiors. One journalist said that he had traveled extensively in the Three Gorges area, and that the actual figures were generally no more than half the official ones. Even senior officials at the Three Gorges Project Resettlement Bureau, he said, do not believe that 200,000 people have been resettled. Several days after our conversation, a report appeared on the front page of Wanxian Daily in which Qi Lin, the head of the Three Gorges Project Resettlement Bureau, was quoted as saying that only 100,000 people had been resettled so far. The report did not say whether these people had been properly resettled according to the government’s own definition, namely that they must be found a new home, new livelihood and compensation for their losses.]

Fortunately for China, there is no Medha Patkar. If one existed, she would have been carted off to a Labor Re-Education Camp (a nice term for jail), raped, starved and tortured. All the frikkin Commies who have been singing the praises of the Communist International (much like the Musalmans singing the praises of the Ummah) suddenly become extremely conscious of sovereignty issues when asked why they protest dam construction in India but not in China.

As for N. Ram, the man will shamelessly tout anything to save his property. After all, he has pimped a girl in the family to Dayanidhi Maran -- check out who Dayanidhi Maran`s wife is.

#119 moron-guru

SO now you are back with your bakwaas. You think we dont know the ugly left-wing politics of Shri N. Ram and Khare at the Hindu? We are all aware of their respect for Stalin, Mao, all communist dictatorships, Saddam Hussein. In other words, any kind of left-wing dictator is their hero. Of course, they believe that the only problem in india is lack of reservation!!

Anyone with the slightest iota of comon-sense knows that capacity constraints are the main issue in India. We need 10,0000s of teachers, we need huge and better schools and colleges. But why discuss how to create those, right? It may actually take hard work and thought. Much better to have everyone fight about quotas !!

What a pathetic loser you are...

#121 our editor has granted abhishek a platform solely on the basis of ideology, and he is abusing it by posting propaganda. he is not interested in any discussion or debate. dear editor, considering the author does post here, please request the author to participate and not do naraybazi, thanks. if not, his chowk-rating ought to be decreased.

Guruji
Can we discuss the points in Khare`s article one by one? I find the article confused, rambling and definitely incapable of providing any solutions.

Why would 50% reservations be better than indentifying the best candidates amongst the OBC`s/SC/ST and giving them the same opportunities as other people have to compete in the JEE , CAT or whatever competitive exam is there in India now? Why can`t the state that Mr.Khare talks of do that? This is the same state that he says failed to keep out the Naxalites. Now we expect this state to do a better job with reservations? Like the excellent job it did with public sector units.

Lastly this has very litte to do with your article which decried the falling of standards in the Indian educational system. Why would you, who has such a low opinion of the system , want 50% reservations in iit?

Re: # 119

Guruji can you honestly answer a question? Suppose someone very close to your heart, your wife or child may be, is critically ill (God forbid, just for sake of argument) and you take her to hospital where the doctor is someone who got there on the basis of quota and somehow you come to know of it. You don`t know the doctor, how good or bad he is. All you know is that he got there through reservations. Will you feel comfortable knowing this?

Regards

It is certainly true that reservation for O.B.Cs. will cause a lot of heart-burning to others. But should the mere fact of this heart burning be allowed to operate as a moral veto against social reform. A lot of heart burning was caused to the British when they left India . It burns the hearts of all whites when the black protest against apartheid in South Africa . When the higher castes constituting less than 20 per cent of the country’s population subjected the rest to all manner of social injustice, it must have caused a lot of heart burning to the lower castes. But now that the lower castes are asking for a modest share of the national cake of power and prestige, a chorus of alarm is being raised on the plea that this will cause heart burning to the ruling elite. Of all the spacious arguments advanced against reservation for backward classes, there is none which beats this one about ‘heart burning’ in sheer sophistry.

Report of the Backward Classes Commission, 1980 (Mandal Commission), First Part, Chapter XIII, pages 57 & 58. Government of India 1980.

Reservation for OBCs - Lessons from the new intolerance

Harish Khare – The Hindu, 12-04-2006

Whether or not the IIMs and IITs are forced to open their doors a little wider, the new fashionable intolerance exhibited in these last few days should be a sobering experience for all of us.
THESE LAST few days have witnessed a fascinating battle for the control of the public discourse. A handful of newspapers and a couple of English language television channels have done their best to stoke a 1990-type hysteria over the proposed new reservation regime in Central educational institutions.

Television crews have been despatched to find voices of ``merit`` that are aghast at the very idea that institutes of management, presumed bastion of merit and competition, are now sought to be pried open to admit children of the lesser gods. Captains of industry are on record as to how a few hundred seats in management schools will erode India`s competitiveness in this age of globalisation.

A twist has been given to the controversy by casting Union Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh as the villain of the piece. All this in the belief that if enough hype is created, the decent man, Manmohan Singh, will intervene and put an end to this ``mischief`` afoot. Even the nice and sincere gentlemen in the Election Commission allowed themselves to be taken in by this elite media noise.

There is little chance of resurrecting the 1990-type hysteria. The reason is simple. The 1990 agitation could be sustained because the largest political party, Congress, lent its support to the anti-Mandal agitation. Rajiv Gandhi`s Congress was peeved at the Raja of Manda making it to the Prime Minister`s chair.

When the V.P. Singh Government opted for the Mandal report, the Congress brought into play all its muscle power to create an illusion of a massive backlash against the reservation regime. Those self-immolations were all paid for by a cynical political party. The V.P. Singh Government had to go not because of the anti-Mandal agitation but because of the intractable intrigues within the Janata Dal. But in popular historical perception, ``Mandal`` is deemed the cause of Mr. Singh`s downfall. Two years later, the same Congress took credit for implementing the Mandal scheme.

2006 is not 1990. The Mandal initiative has helped to change the face of the Indian polity and society. The grammar of entitlement has become part of the language of Indian politics. There can be a debate on how to go about it but all political parties accept the logic and reality of the Constitution (93rd Amendment) Act, 2005. As and when the Human Resource Development Ministry comes up with a Bill commensurate with the 93rd Amendment, Parliament and the country will get to debate the issue anew.

But the 2006 controversy has only reminded one and all of how entrenched social prejudices remain and how deep runs the hostility to change in areas where it matters the most. Suddenly it seems fashionable to speak of ``them`` who now dare want to enter the holy portals of management and technology institutes.

All political systems witness a continuous struggle over societal resources, according to the accepted rules of the game. In India these rules are prescribed in the Constitution but are always reinterpreted according to the distribution of power. As it were, power — political and electoral — has passed into the hands of the less socially and educationally advanced groups.

And it is only a matter of time before the logic of democracy and numbers asserts itself in every sphere of social activity.
Today it is the IIMs and IITs that are sought to meet the demands of social justice, tomorrow it will be the private sector that will be called upon to broad-base its mostly caste-based personnel structures. Those who demand and get, and prosper from the state`s protection cannot remain oblivious to its obligation to engineer some kind of equity.

The crux of our present day dilemma was foreseen many years ago by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar. In the last sitting of the Constituent Assembly, he noted: ``We are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality. In politics, we will be recognising the principle of one man-one vote and one vote-one value. In our social and economic life, we shall by reason of our social and economic structure, continue to deny the principle of one man-one value.
How long shall we continue to live this life of contradictions? How long shall we continue to deny equality in our social and economic life? If we continue to deny it for long, we will do so only by putting our political democracy in peril.

We must remove this contradiction at the earlier possible moment or else those who suffer from inequality will blow up the structure of political democracy which this assembly has so laboriously built up.``

Dr. Ambedkar, social justice, egalitarianism, and equity seem obsolete to the influential sections of the Indian society. Our discourse-manufacturers have worked themselves into a comfortable delusion that the ``market`` has made India a vast level-playing field and therefore any suggestion of any kind of affirmative action is a violation of some sacred mantra.

``Reservation`` is deemed one of those devious stratagems these undesirable politicians are forever devising just to keep themselves in power. It is taken as an affront to a new India that thinks of itself as a partner in a cosmopolitan march to prosperity. The unstated claim is that the market has cured India of all its social inequalities and inequities.

Power of the market
The assumption is that the 300-million strong consumerist middle class has sorted out its caste stratifications and is now uniformly and unanimously worshipping on the altar of merit and competence. The curative power of market has melted away social distinctions and disadvantages.

Politics and politicians have failed India and they should not be allowed to dispel the market magic. This middle class, the assumption goes, is capable of propelling India into becoming a super economic power and is smart enough to engage with the global economy on competitive terms. In any case, this middle class need not be hobbled by the burden of the rest of the 700 million and their deprivations.

In the midst of the market euphoria, there is a strong reluctance to see, let alone acknowledge, inequalities. Take for instance the controversy a few months ago over the so-called ``Muslim headcount`` in the armed forces. The voices that raised a din on the Muslim headcount are, more or less, the same kicking up a shindy on ``reservation.``
Last year, for example, only 11 Muslim candidates could make the grade out of the 422 men and women selected for the IAS, IFS, IPS and other Central services.
Of these 11, eight made it in the category of Other Backward Classes (OBC). No one wants to acknowledge the near-systemic marginalisation of the largest minority in the country.

Yet any attempt to even catalogue discrimination and disadvantages faced by the minorities is immediately dubbed anti-merit, anti-progress, and anti-national. As long as a problem is not acknowledged, there will be no obligation to find a solution.

But precisely because the new economy is creating new inequalities in our society, the Indian state and its political instruments are duty-bound to find ways of institutionalising some kind of fairness. This duty has become even more pronounced now that the state has been forced to retreat from many areas of economic activity.

If the politicians were not to address themselves to the aspirations and dreams of the socially disadvantageous groups, the polity and economy would not experience the peace to enjoy the fruits of the eight per cent economic growth.

As it is, vast chunks of the country have already come under the naxalite sway, amenable neither to the state`s coercion nor to the lure of the market. The 2006 reservation controversy will not get resolved easily.
Whether or not the IIMs and IITs are forced to open their doors a little wider, the new fashionable intolerance exhibited in these last few days should be a sobering experience for all of us.
The Constitution is not a convenient document but a compact that the people of India made among themselves. That compact is premised on the promise of an egalitarian social order. The new intolerance is at odds with that promise. Promoters and patrons of the new economy need to realise the implications of this new intolerance

abe harimau, do you think tamilnadu is worse-off as compared to other states who have less reservation than not? stick to real evidence here. why is tamilnadu high on literacy, education and so much becoming detrit that hamidm and urstruly plan to move there?

Re: # 114


the amount of medals, nobels we get based on our talents are not proportionate to our population hence there has to be ``social justice`` and end to such ``discriminatory`` policies.

Hence the Reservation Ministry headed by arjun singh should propose these:

based on our population we should DEMAND around 17% of olympic golds, world trade, Nobels ......... all goodies in the world.

---

also, you are too harsh on arjun. he is just a paltu kutta of the gandhi family. he is just a pawn and is curently dancing to the tune of teh gandhi clan.

Considering that we have reservation for the most powerful position in India, I am not surprised at reservations for the Brain-Dead in other vocations.

I am referring to the lock that the Nehru clan has on the Prime Ministership.

The following is making the rounds on the Internet:

I think we should have job reservations in all the fields. I completely support the PM and all the politicians for promoting this. Let`s start the reservation with our cricket team. We should have 10 percent reservation for muslims. 30 percent for OBC, SC/ST like that. Cricket rules should be modified accordingly. The boundary circle should be reduced for an SC/ST player. The four hit by an OBC player should be considered as a six and a six hit by a OBC player should be counted as 8 runs.

An OBC player scoring 60 runs should be declared as a century. We should influence ICC and make rules so that the pace bowlers like Shoaib Akhtar should not bowl fast balls to our OBC player. Bowlers should bowl maximum speed of 80 kilometer per hour to an OBC player. Any delivery above this speed should be made illegal.

Also we should have reservation in Olympics. In the 100 meters race, an OBC player should be given a gold medal if he runs 80 meters. There can be reservation in Government jobs also. Let`s recruit SC/ST and OBC pilots for aircrafts which are carrying the ministers and politicians (that can really help the country.. )

Ensure that only SC/ST and OBC doctors do the operations for the ministers and other politicians. (Another way of saving the country..) Let`s be creative and think of ways and means to guide INDIA forward...Let`s show the world that INDIA is a GREAT country. Let`s be proud of being an INDIAN..

May the good breed of politicans like ARJUN SINGH long live...

given that reservation is a political reality, it will be interesting to see how the society adjusts. IIT/IIMs are a small part of society. assuming a 4 fold increase in higher learning inst over next 20 years, how much will be in private sector where they will steal the faculty from IITs? will those students live in separate dorms? will there be a sharp decline in student quality and graduation rate? what was the experience in the south, where 70% of seats have been reserved?

Re: # 108 by pmishra2

Exactly. And for this we need people who take active interest in school education instead of controlling higher education/IIT/IIMs etc. These higher education centres are doing more or less fine. They should be left alone. What we desperately need is more schools, more teachers, more attendance. Add to this expansion of police force and low-level judiciary for improvement of law and order, and more basic medicare and sanitation personnel.

One last bit on reservations, here is what Andre Betielle mentioned to the prime minister, in his letter of resignation from the Knowledge Commission

`` We can either move forward and create centres of academic excellence or go along with the demands of identity politics based on caste and community, but we cannot do both......``

Here is the link to the full text of the resignation letter.

http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20060522&fname=pbm&sid=2

Actually the link should have been

http://ia.rediff.com/news/2006/may/23franc.htm?q=sp&file=.htm