Author: Editorial
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: May 24, 2007
Introduction: UPA's devious move to divide
India
The UPA Government has a perverse, almost
morbid, fetish for caste and community based reservations. After disturbing
social amity by pushing through an odious law - it has since been put on hold
by the Supreme Court - that sets aside 27 per cent seats for 'socially and
educationally backward classes' (OBCs) in institutions of higher education
and militates against all tenets of equal rights, apart from making merit
a punishable offence, the Government is now toying with the idea of introducing
communal quotas under the garb of minority welfare. The report of the National
Commission for Linguistic and Religious Minorities is of a piece with the
regressive quota policy of the Congress-led Government. The commission has
done an excellent command performance for which its chairman, Justice Ranganath
Misra, can justifiably claim much credit; indeed, he can flaunt the report
as further evidence of his political loyalty. The last time he did so was
when he produced a cockamamie report on the ghastly anti-Sikh pogrom of 1984,
skilfully whitewashing the role of Congress leaders who led murderous mobs
baying for the blood of innocent Sikh men, women and children and exonerating
the man who famously declared that when a big tree falls, the ground is bound
to shake. This time, Mr Misra has excelled himself: He has contrived, with
the help of individuals like Mr Tahir Mahmood whose credentials leave much
to be desired, a 'welfare scheme' for India's minorities by recommending that
Government jobs and seats in educational institutions be reserved for them
in proportion to their demographic strength.
According to the masterminds behind this latest
endeavour to divide India along communal lines and thus further fragment Indian
society, welfare for minorities - what they mean is Muslims - lies in declaring
the whole lot as "backward" - "notably without qualifying the
word 'backward' with the words socially and educationally" - and institutionalising
15 per cent reservation for them in jobs and educational institutions. Aware
of the Supreme Court bar on quotas exceeding 50 per cent, Mr Misra and his
colleagues have proposed an insidious route for achieving their dangerous
objective of introducing communal quotas: Create quotas within existing quotas
for OBCs and Dalits. What this means is that Dalit Christians, for instance,
will get a proportionate quota within that meant for Dalits, while other minorities,
say Muslims and Christians, will get a similar proportionate share of the
quota meant for OBCs. This is patently unacceptable, not least because a Government
driven by narrow political considerations and rank minorityism cannot snatch
away benefits from those who truly deserve them, for instance the Scheduled
Castes. The Congress leadership, such as it is, may exult in acquiring yet
another instrument of appeasement in the hope that Muslims and Christians
will now flock to the party in droves during election time. But India can
only express concern at this rapid communalisation of policy. From banking
to social welfare to public spending, the UPA regime is obsessed with depriving
others to appease minorities. The latest ploy should set alarm bells ringing
across the length and breadth of the country. This is not about just politics.
