Lokpal and reservation appear to be two completely different ideas and no sane person would think of marring them together. But then politics is art of possibilities. In it's haste to play to minority galleries ahead of UP election congress seems to be determined to redefine notion of secularism.
Debate about reservation always seems to be focused on “to whom” aspect and in post Mandal era we seem to have given up on the question of “why reservation”. Dr. Ambedkar wanted reservation for scheduled casts on the grounds of historical discrimination against them and to ensure social justice.Whether reservation is the only and correct way of providing helping hand to the deprived scheduled cast can be seriously debated however no right thinking person would disagree that helping hand was indeed required. In principal helping hand is provided to make sure that in Independent India there is level playing field for the historically deprived section of society.
Body blow was delivered to this logic when VP Singh decided to bring OBCs under reservation umbrella. By including OBCs we have deviated from agreed upon principal of reservation. Reservation cannot be provided to a community just because majority of the people from that community did not find their way up the economic ladder. There has to be beyond reasonable doubt evidence that social discrimination did not provide level playing field to the particular community and hence they were not able to find they were up. I do not think OBCs come clean if put to test on aforementioned criteria.
As if this was not bad enough congress and other “secular” political parties are raising their pitch for providing reservation to minorities. Our constitution does not permit reservation based on religion and that makes lot of sense for a secular democracy like India. Besides many Muslim casts already fall under OBC category.
Was there a social discrimination against Muslims at any point in pre and post independent India? Did Muslims comprise of oppressed class at any point in time? Didn't they rule many parts of India for more than 200 years? How can community which once belonged to ruling class claim to be victim of social injustice? Is it not true that defiance to give up Madarsa education and refusal to embrace modern mainstream education is the root cause of lack of job opportunities for them?
It’s true that vast section of Muslim population lives well below acceptable living standards and so does the vast section of Hindu population (even ones which do not fall under any reserved categories).Does that mean Muslim should be given reservation? If yes then why not include economically weaker section of society irrespective of their cast and religion? If poor from Brahmin or a Kshatriya cast cannot be brought under reservation because that goes against principal of reservation then same logic disqualifies Muslims.
There is one more dangerous repercussion of religion based reservation that is conversion. In India barring few states such as Gujarat conversion is legal. There is serious polarization of opinion on whether change of religion should be permitted. Allegations and counter allegations are often made by both the parties. Religion based reservation would definitely incentivize conversion from majority to minority religion and in turn would act as fuel to the fire in an already confrontational problem.
Secularism essentially means separation of church and state. In an ideal secular democratic liberal polity, which India must strive hard to become one, there should be no place for religion based quota. Lets hope this petty politics of religion based quota is defeated and pseudo secular forces do not succeed in making necessary constitutional amendment.
Anurag Choudhary.
