Crutches for the able-Bodied

jang #29 Thanks.I dont mind avuncular advice at all.:-) I had read something about Bastar in particular that how people there are resisting traditional education because it interferes with their occupation.They were helped,though, by some technical advice regarding their work. Moreover, I do realize that my statement, ``So, no one from the scheduled tribes of bastar would ever come into the creamy layer`` was more in the rhetoric mode. But I still believe that emphasis has to be on non traditional education and empowerment in their occupation.And I certainly dont believe that Aff Ack is a bad thing, only it should be done in a planned and a timebound manner,with specific statement of goals and closure, and not be misused as a political instrument.

All,

Thanks for the sharing of ideas, it is always a pleasure.

And a Very Happy New Year! Have a great year ahead and NJoy!!

Cheers,
Rahul

rahul, (at the risk of souding avuncular), i recommend that you do a field study to get some real experience. the tribals of bastar (there was a chowk interactor here a while back) have gotten ahead due to aff-ack (in this case due to christian missionary work). i have met many SC-ST departmental heads in organisations such as CPWD, who came from slums on the outskirts of villages, and they have told me stories of drunken feasts that would develope because a village buffalo died and their community got duty to take care of it.

so, while you have logic based on some axioms, some supporting field work (maybe just anecdotal) is needed to deepen your understanding.

dost-mittar #27 Yes, the creamy layer concept is valid.But there are some practical problems with it.Mostly, the inhabitants of the lowest rung of society are categorised by their castes.So, no one from the scheduled tribes of bastar would ever come into the creamy layer.Actually, the inhabitants of the lowest rung of the caste hierarchy are in most cases exploited by the BCs and OBCs who are forming the creamy layer.As has been discussed earlier too, relevant education and rural loan schemes etc. are the only way to get them out of their poverty.
Studying the traditional education and trying to get a job is not a good percentage choice for them right now.It may be,when they are more well off, through their traditional occupations.Till then it is high risk and not fesible.So the emphasis should be in empowering them in their current occupations through relevant education etc.

rahulm:

The kind of things you mention - education, health, nutrition, etc. are essential for the uplift of the backward castes, but I do not think that they are sufficient to offset the historical and systemic discriminations faced by them.

When I was a student at the University of Wisconsin during the sixties, it was hard to find a black student and, if you did, he was more likely to be a foreign African student than an American. Now, as a result of the affirmative action taken by all universities, you are likely to see black students in large numbers at every US university.

When I started working in the Canadian govt, there were very few francophones at the executive level in the federal civil service. The Trudeau govt. put pressure on the bureaucracy and now, you see them fully represented at all senior levels of bureaucracy. Almost the only women when I started working were secretaries who typed and made coffee for the rest of us. And then came the year of the women and push for gender equality in the workplace. Now, you see women almost proportionally represented at all levels.

All these developments took place because of affirmative actions of one kind or another. In every case, they also created a creamy layer, which is inevitable as the fittest of the weaker segment are able to take advantage of the new opportunities that become available. What is important is to put in mechanisms to ensure that this process is not abused by a few. Over time the creamy layer expands and creates role models and networks for others of their kind to follow in their footsteps. This is what is now available to the poor upper castes and not available to those in the lower castes.

rahul
i am not talking of govt schools. i am talking of govt grant schools. these schools are are typically run by an educational trust and the salaries of teachers are covered by the govt and are top-notch (most of the times higher than a run-of-the-mill convent school). these school formed the backbone of middle class folks in mumbai and were main contributors to top graduates. the current gen of parents (graduates of the same schools) talk of lack of zeal and such soft factors in criticising the aff-ack teachers, and dont like to send their kids unless due to lack of choice. so i am unclear if the teachers are actually bad or the parents aspirations have gone up.

i have heard of medical collges producing inferior doctors, but i disagree that the quality os lowered. i mean, you just cannot become a surgeon easily if you are bad, since no one will teach you. for an primary care, you need not be exceptional anyways. the same goes for our public sector employment. they are organizationaly rotten with or without aff-ack,due to the nature of the institution and not becuase of its people. the brahmin babus are as efficient in corruption as their bc counterparts.

your point regarding your room-mate should not have used the crutches is interesting. the kid from slum would be ill-prepared to ``accept`` an IIT education, dont you think? he would tend to drown.

so, i think case for if the aff-ack has -ve effects is not well made but is full of innuendos.

Dear namesake :-)

``If reservation continues unabated, the radicalization of the society would continue and it can only be curbed when there is significant polarization in the society...``. Who says radicalization has not already happened in the society. In the boondocks of UP & Bihar, you are what your surname is. People who grew up oblivious of casteist and communal loyalities are being forced to grapple with identity issues. How is it possible for someone who was denied admission to a college due to reservation to stay sanguine about caste issues? On one hand, there is reverse-discrimination in the name of social engineering, on the other there is an invocation to tear down the caste system.

Who gets impacted? The salaried class, the middle and lower-middle classes who have nothing but their skills to bank on. These are not the people with acres of land, scores of cattle and brick kilns. The future of their kids is dependent on them getting admission to schools and colleges, staying clear of politics and finally landing a job in some sector. If the kids are imbecile, parents accept their fate with a heavy heart and apply bank loan or sell jewellery to help him open a grocery store or marry her off to a suitable boy. But if the kid is bright, and is not allowed in a job that he desrves coz he happened to be born in the wrong caste, the impact can be devastating.

The upper castes/other sections of society adversly impacted by reservation will never vote en-bloc coz they are not impacted en-bloc. Only those who need jobs, admission to colleges and representation in legislative bodies feel the pinch.

Why did I write the article, it does not alter the ground situation one bit? Coz I wanted to express the `other` point-of-view on Chowk after DMji and Shivam Vij supported reservation in private sector.

Just to set the record straight...

When I was in convent, our school organized a `Shram-daan` program to teach poor students. After the final bells on Saturday, kids from the neighbouring Ambedkar Gram used to assemble in our school and we used to teach them for a couple of hours. Some kids were bright; others were dumb, same as any other place on earth. I didn`t find them any different from other kids of their age (if we discount the affluence factor).

Fast forward to Engineering College, my roomy was SC. He was the zonal topper of CBSE board (no footnote or asterisk there) and NTSE scholarship holder. If my memory serves me right, he stayed in top 10 when we graduated and bagged a couple of jobs - one each with a public and private sector major, both without mentioning his caste in the profile submitted to Training & Placement Office during the campus interviews.

It goes without saying that he would have qualified JEE even in General category. But, he used the crutches when they were offered. I`m sure it was a blow to his self-esteem when nasty questions were hurled in his direction due to his rank in the reserved category. How many questions did he solve? What did he expect his score was?

Not only did he scar his otherwise unblemished career record due to the lure of sure-shot selection, he pre-empted that bright kid from Ambedkar Gram who was more needy. Lets not worry about giving sure-shot employment to zonal toppers, they`ll fend for themselves. We should concentrate on providing competitive education to kids from Ambedkar Gram.

Netizen,

Our problem is that we want to plug the gaps of a system that is inherently defeatist and regressive. However hard we try, we can`t make this system fool-proof. Let`s trash it like all the other wrong policy measures of the past - Nehruvian socialism, pacifism and inward-looking swadeshi movement.

DMji,

There is no way we can improve the efficiency of a system that has a faulty design. Dump it and design a new system rather than spending resources on fixing it time and again. If there is good education, law & order is maintained, people are encouraged to create wealth and corruption curbed, we`ll not need absurd ideas like reservation. Don`t try to defend the indefensible in the name of liberalism.

BTW, this `bigger danger` bait is an attempt to deflect attention from the main issue. It is like saying that we should not worry about terrorists blowing our kids because the number of people killed by terrorism is 5000 per year while malaria kills 50,000!

Jang,

As I said before, `SC/ST category, all appeared selected`. The story of students getting selected to medical colleges after scoring negative marks in entrance exam is too well known to be repeated. If one belongs to reserved category, promotion is guaranteed in govt. jobs. Can you imagine the measurement criteria for promotion is not comparison with peers, but peers of the same category! If one goes by records, there are two top performers in any organization - one of general category and the other of reserved category. And then, our social engineering proponents pontificate that this biased system would somehow end the biases in our society. They don`t see the absurdity and paradox in their arguments. Think about it, these are the very same people who want to laugh Bush out of the town because he is fighting a war to guarantee peace :-)

The problem of teaching standards in govt. schools is not related to reservation.

Yaar, these are mostly PG people with courses like B.Ed under their belt. They are paid measly sums, made to work in schools without basic facilities, asked to teach kids who are poor, come from under-privileged backgrounds and likely to bolt out of their classes before they reach middle school. So, they choose the right path by concentrating on tuitions and other sources of additional income. Govt. job is anyway safe, so why bother struggling in classrooms without a roof...

Some serious thinking is to be done as to how ``affirmative action`` can be curbed.My own theory on this is that ethnic groups vote as a chunk when they feel that they are shortchanged as a group. In democracy, this kind of voting as a chunk is very necessary to be in some kind of a bargaining position. Debates and discussions are not going to help.I dont think that upper castes who are not getting the benefits of reservation are yet pushed into such a tight corner that they start voting on this issue. When they do, then lets see what happens. Till then, it is very easy for political entrepreneus to rally the backward castes to vote for them and maintain the status quo. Even if the backward castes feel that they are unfairly getting benefits, they would hold on to that.Anyone would.Even I would have done that.
The framers of the constitution had enough foresight to think about reservation, but I dont think they had enough foresight to think about the abuse of this instrument. If reservation continues unabated, the radicalization of the society would continue and it can only be curbed when there is significant polarization in the society and this becomes a major voting issue.

Rahul,

Has affirmative action caused loss in quality? One constant claim i hear from ``in india`` relatives is that the quaity of teachers in government subsidy schools has dropped due to AffAck. I am sure there are no majot studies on this, but i have not heard any other anecdotal stuff either.

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I have earlier expressed my support for reservations. But I think that we must learn lessons from past experience and ensure that the unintended effects of proactive measures for the deserving, namely, the creation of creamy layers and a push to be classified as OBCs, are mitigated and efficiencies maintained.

The bigger danger comes not from extending affirmative action to the private sector but by pulling back on the reform process despite Manmohan Singh. Here is a piece by an insider I respect, Shankar Acharya, who was instrumental in initiating the reform process.




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Bad ideas are winning!

December 28, 2004


Six months ago (Bad ideas versus good men), I noted the `intriguing contrast` between the `exceptionally high calibre` of this government`s top economic management team (Manmohan Singh, Chidambaram, and Montek Ahluwalia) and the `poor quality of economic ideas swirling around in the Common Minimum Programme and ministerial pronouncements.`

I went on to predict that `such tension between bad ideas and good economic managers cannot persist indefinitely. Economic governance over the next few months should be a fascinating battle between good men and bad ideas, a battle which will yield winners and losers.`

Half a year later, it`s time for an initial stocktaking.

With profound sadness I have to record that Bad Ideas seem to be trouncing Good Men. Let me substantiate. And let me organise the dispiriting evidence under some policy categories.

Employment creation

Most economists agree that our complex and inflexible labour laws are probably the single most important cause of stagnant employment in the organised segment of the economy, especially industry.

The CMP dimmed hopes of progress in this area. And sure enough, there has been none. Correspondingly, the prospects for rapid growth of good jobs in modern factory employment remain dim.

Instead, the government has opted to fulfil the CMP promise of an Employment Guarantee Act and has tabled a Bill in Parliament last fortnight.

I will not repeat my profound concerns about its onerous fiscal consequences (Business Standard, November 30). Others have also emphasised the large scope for corruption and `leakages` and the costs of diverting scarce resources from social and economic infrastructure.

Many analysts agree that the new Act will, over time, develop into a horribly expensive gravy train for political patronage with little durable benefit for the poor.

Political expediency will dictate the expansion of the ``benefits`` of the scheme, quite independent of its efficacy in serving the avowed objectives.

Restructuring the public sector

Public enterprises continue to dominate large chunks of the Indian economy, especially energy, banking, insurance and transportation.

This is despite almost a decade of ministerial pronouncements to the effect that `the business of government is not business.` As envisaged in the CMP, the privatisation process is pretty dead in the water.

Predictably, talk of selling loss-making enterprises remains just that, talk. Even divestment, in the sense of selling minority shareholding to the public, is taking the slow train.

Indeed, a new Board for Reconstruction of Public Sector Enterprises has just replaced the old Divestment Commission. Apparently, its focus will be on reviving PSEs.

No matter that many years and many thousands of crores of wasted government money have demonstrated the utter futility of pursuing this objective. Ask any of the last ten Union expenditure secretaries.

What`s more, the new Board has been established even before the old BIFR has gracefully left the stage, prompting this newspaper to editorially coin (December 23) ``a new Parkinson`s Law which stipulates that sick public sector companies will not only not die but bodies to revive them will proliferate``!

Infrastructure

The follow-through on the Electricity Act (2003) remains painfully slow. Indeed, there is some question as to whether the `review` threatened in the CMP is really behind us or not.

Railway finances, organisation and operations remain as immune to reform as ever, notwithstanding the metronomic regularity of major accidents.

National highway development continues as a bright spot, even as state and rural roads languish for lack of funds and maintenance.

The decade-old plans to privatise the national airlines seem to have been shelved, while the good intentions to induct the private sector in metro airport development remain vulnerable to political hurdles, regulatory uncertainty and state government caprices.

Telecom is forging ahead despite regulatory favouritism but urban infrastructure development continues to be mired in dismal municipal finances and governance.

In energy, coal continues to be a political football, while oil and gas is still hostage to administered prices, political whims and oligopolistic behemoths, public and private. Not much is being done to forestall the water wars in our future.

The Planning Commission has been struggling manfully with these key infrastructure issues, although it did get distracted temporarily by a weird and unworkable scheme to use forex for infrastructure finance.

In short, the policy thrusts to address the country`s immense infrastructure needs are still incremental and inadequate.

Financial sector

Whatever happened to the brave new world of financial sector reforms? Well, the NDA government in its final year rolled back earlier progress, by boosting `directed credit`, proliferating interest rates and pursuing pointless mergers of government-controlled financial intermediaries.

The UPA government appears distressingly comfortable with these retrograde tendencies. Government ownership of PSU banks has been firmly reiterated.

A confusing flirtation continues with the issue of higher foreign ownership in private banks. What is patently lacking is a long-term vision for the banking sector.

If the dominant elements of the implicit game plan are government control, heavy directed credit, and significant interest rate controls, then the campaign slogans about a modern financial sector should be quietly buried.

The private insurance sector is maturing steadily. Growth would be faster if the last Budget`s commitment to raise the equity cap on foreign ownership through an amendment of law had not run into implacable opposition from the Left and a tetchy BJP.

The Left is also successfully blocking the lifting of the cap on foreign shareholding in telecom and foreign participation in the retail sector.

The government`s weakness in this area is also shown by its apparent flip-flop on the dilution of Press Note 18, which is currently tilted in favour of the domestic partner in foreign collaborations.

Tax reforms

The last Budget did not help the cause of tax reform. A bad tax on stock transactions was launched somewhat clumsily.

The taxation of long-term equity capital gains was abolished, creating a distinctly uncomfortable situation (for a poor country) in which owners of (equity) capital are neither taxed on dividend earnings nor on capital gains, while all forms of labour income are taxable.

If the Left was less preoccupied with outdated sloganeering and a little more thoughtful, it might have raised cogent objections to such proposals.

While the date for inducting state VATs has been reset for April 1, 2005, the reports about the likely design are quite disconcerting.

In particular, a wide dispersion of rates and the slotting of a very large number of commodities at the concessional 4 per cent rate do not augur at all well for this VAT experiment.

And whatever happened to the Kelkar ideas for a national goods and services tax? The government has not encouraged any serious debate.

Well, that`s quite a lot of Bad Ideas for just six months. There isn`t much of a clarion call for economic reform in any of the above. Where are the Good Men in all this? Overwhelmed, under siege or complicit?

Perhaps a bit of all three? Is there no silver lining? Well, maybe there is. It`s in the resilience of the Indian economy and the dynamism of its people.

As we look forward to a new year, let us hope that this resilience and dynamism reinvigorate the Good Men to fight the good fight and subdue the Bad Ideas … and perhaps even implement some good ones!

The author is Member, 12th Finance Commission and a Professor at ICRIER. The views expressed are strictly personal.

In reply to #13 by rahulmal

For the politicians/socialist class reservation seems to be the Mother of all panacea. They don`t have to deal with the real problems. There are no systems to see how these policies are having a effect on the populace. How many of the backward people have progressed. At this rate how long will it take to realise the aim of reservation. What else could be done to plug the loopholes in the reservation policy. But who is really concerned about all this. Come every twenty years and renew the policy. Because, whoever favors reservation is a humane person, whoever opposes is racist. For a politician to oppose reservaiton would be a death knell to his political career.
If any political class in the country had a vision and the dedication to uplift not only the BC but all economically BC we would not have needed reservation for so long. As you said those benefitting from these poilcies for the past 50 years don`t want or won`t be able to compete without the crutches of reservation. Personally I don`t expect anything to change. When the PM could not even stop Laloo from using railways as his personal jagir in organizing Patna rally, I doubt whether any unbiased decisions will be taken in the case of reservation in the private sector.

Halur,

Thanks for correcting! I had read an article on Nadars in a magazine sometime back. Amritrajs and Shiv Nadar were presented as case studies and they were bracketed as Dalits. I`ll try to get the details of the article, should be Outlook or India Today...

BTW, no wilful mis-representation, worst case got the sources wrong!