Quotas will not help anyone if economy doesn’t expand

In the Supreme Court, the Centre on Thursday opposed the move of the Maharashtra government to conduct a census for Other Backward Castes (OBC) for Census 2021, which has already been delayed on account of Covid, and the technical reasons it cited appear to hold water.

But is that all there is to the story, or is there more? In contrast, important regional parties in various states associated with OBC identities and their leaders, besides leaders of some state parties courting the substantial OBC vote in elections, as well as an important BJP leader from Bihar like Sushil Modi — who may be deemed to be from an OBC background although he does not usually flaunt this — have pitched themselves in favour of an OBC census.

The objection that the Centre voiced in the Supreme Court is that, on account of errors of enumerators and “inherent flaws” in conducting the Census, the total number of OBCs had risen astronomically — from 4,174 in the 1931 Census (all castes) to more than 46 lakh (all castes) in the Social and Economic Caste Census of 1911 (all castes). This is clearly ludicrous. Details of a similar type were brought out, citing the example of Maharashtra.

If this is the way census enumeration is done, it is something of a mystery why the Centre did not question the data suo motu in the past decade or bring the matter before Parliament and the state legislatures. With infirmities such as those cited by the Centre before the top court, it is quite obvious that the data collected in 2011 is pointless and cannot be the basis for any policy, particularly those pertaining to reservation. What is to be done? It may be best to have a wide national consultation instead of either the government or its opponents donning the mantle of wisdom.

But what’s to be done with the question of reservations itself? In light of the way the discussion has evolved, this has become one of the more vexed — and important — questions in India. In the early years after Independence, the reservation sought was for only the SC and ST categories, and was meant to have a finite horizon. There appears to be no nationwide audit of beneficiaries and the quota for these sections continue without fully knowing if people on the ground are really gaining or whether the benefits are being cornered by the “creamy layer”, i.e. among the SC/ST those who continue to gain from quota rules over generations long after becoming empowered in all senses of the term.

In course of time, on account of political compulsions, the category for OBC reservations was brought into the quotas mix, hugely benefiting some parties. A further demand then came to be raised for reservations for those who had departed the caste-ridden Hindu fold and converted to other faiths in search of social status. The quota-seeking categories kept bulging, crossing in many states the 50 per cent cap the Supreme Court had imposed.

The way things are going, perhaps the country will decide on taking quota benefits in education, employment and promotions in the government and private sectors for around 90 per cent of the population, excluding from it only a small section of the so-called upper caste.

But there is a practical difficulty. If the economy does not carry on expanding, then all the jostling and clamour for education, jobs and votes will be amongst the evidently needy sections of society. The sustainability of that may need to be examined by experts — preferably chosen from among quota seekers themselves.

With infirmities such as those cited by the Centre before the top court, it is quite obvious that the data collected in 2011 is pointless and cannot be the basis for any policy