My Reserved Life
I tramped through the dirty downtrodden, wait, the noun that follows is defined as roads, but that was but one of the troubles that crease my worried brow. My mood, as any blind beggar with the meanest powers of observation would aptly put it, was far from upbeat. For most of the blighted 10 billion people who populate the earth and are unaware of my existence, I am merely a 17 year old boy who is trampling through the streets of a city called Mahamumbai in the year 2036. Oh yes, I am a not-so-proud citizen of a developing country – India.
I hear frequent tall tales of how India was supposed to be one of the greatest nations of all, of how we emerged from the colonial rule, overcome poverty, hunger, disease, established the world’s largest democracy, of how the students from our universities landed the best jobs in the world, of how Indians were rumoured to be the citizens of a superpower, and how there was a time when our growth rate was second to none and how (here’s the one with the greatest height) and how - for those who lost track of the sentence – there was indeed a time when there were equal opportunities for all.
Then, around three decades back, our fortunes took a turn for the worse. There occurred a paradigm shift, a policy that was initiated by the logically challenged. Then our education system and soon the entire social establishment went to the canids.
However, this tale is not about the digression of our society. Instead it’s the current pathetic state of affairs that we have landed in. Here are the few rules that have come up in the last few years. The rules have all been adaptations of Rule 16 (4), the rule established few years after independence that insisted on reservations for those sections of Indians who were not adequately represented. Soon, as standards reduced, grammar deteriorated and adequate began to be interpreted as proportional. Now there is 47% reservation for OBCs in all Universities, Central and Private Sector Jobs, 28% for SC/STs and another 15% left to the whims and fancies of the college/company. However, mind you, this is merely another type of affirmative action taken to uplift the downtrodden masses. It is of no consequence that quite a large percentage of the supposed upper class is in a lower income bracket. It does not matter if the supposed lower class lands up in the best institutes due to their caste certificate, you are a caste-driven fanatic if you are of the opinion that it is unfair that they have access to the best amenities due to virtue of being born in a family with a surname that entitles them to classified as “low class”
It was around two or more decades ago that up to 50% of seats were reserved in all Central Universities due to a minister with delusions of grandeur. Few years later, all private institutions had reservations. For private institutions to reservation in private jobs was no quantum leap, merely an incident that provoked a little bit of outrage, vied for print space in media reports and was accepted and taken in stride. Few minor changes then took place. Firstly, income tax was reduced for all citizens belonging to the castes and subcastes that Mr. BP Mandal has enumerated in his report in the 1980s. A system was introduced by which they got 10% discounts in all stores.
Then one of our many political maestros hit upon the idea, why not introduce reservations in politics? This too faced little opposition as no one wanted to commit political hara-kiri by denying the “socially backward” the right to be represented in the making of the laws of the nation. Now, every 3rd President must be an OBC or an SC/ST else we are not providing retribution to the people for historical grievances committed on their ancestors 5000 years ago by the ancestors of the elitist general class.
More rules emerged. Ludicrous yes, but some bordered on the verge of insanity. Like the one which stated that any backward class citizen who had an annual income greater than 27 lakhs, if his business crashed, he would receive compensation from the government. If a disaster occurred, the first to be rescued and rehabilitated would be the supposed posterior of Indian Society
The downside of having reservations was that when thousands got into universities by pure anomaly of fate, few passed. The worried government instantly reduced the education system by claiming that it laid too much stress on the brain of the youth. When this did not achieve desired results, the citizens of the backward class were encouraged and provided financial support to raise larger families so that the number of students would increase and the chances of a smart young un being born and capable of passing through the university was higher. In retrospect, many admit that might not have been the smartest piece of legislation but then, it was done by the people and for the people. With the result that now there were more students clamouring for less seats with more competition.
Any reader, who not being present in this wondorous time may wonder, why did the government not increase seats in universities, provide more jobs and privatize the airlines or the railways to provide more job opportunities? Well, when other nations noticed that the talent coming out from the top brass of Indian Universities was not up to their expectations, a supposed travesty of justice occurred due to which they lost faith in the Indian economy. Due to reduction in Foreign Investment, the Sensex crashed. It is currently struggling at around 8000 points.
Most of our budding industrial leaders left India to make their fortune in foreign lands. Duly accuse of being treacherous and unpatriotic, the finest crème de la crème of emerging India intelligentsia moved to other nations where opportunities were not denied by virtue of birth.
It’s a shame. The current scenario is reminiscent of Ayn Rand’s work – Atlas Shrugged where industry collapses. This is worse. The fabric of society into which we all were interwoven as one people in one nation has been shredded to bits by those who lust to reside in corridors of power.
Well, we had a debate in class about the current situations. When I laid across my viewpoint (which I had chanced to read in some old archive of one of a newspaper) that in 2006, when there 50% of the population constituted OBCs, and assuming atleast 0.25% grew to be of college going age, was it too difficult to find few thousand meritorious brilliant students from the OBC category out of the 13 lakh students? If yes, were we not undermining the intellectual capacity of these people? They are humans, born as equal as us. They do need to grow up holding crutches. They are capable enough to be given enough dignity to make their mark in society without the aid of a caste certificate.
If by some chaotic fluke, they weren’t then what was the point of including students devoid of intellect in an institution which would drive them nuts? Was the problem being addressed by simply laying down reservations or did the problem lie deep within at the very roots? On hearing this, I was accused of developing casteist undertones, being a bad influence on the fragile minds of other youngsters and sent to therapy for having a dubious psychological profile and unpatriotic thoughts.
As a punishment, I was asked to write a 300 word composition on My Motherland. The other students were shocked to hear that such a harsh punishment was meted out to me. Most textbooks after all had only 180 words on such topics. Well, I wrote this and poured all my angst, my frustration, the pity that a once proud nation was reduced to and a hope that in other parallel multiverses, the future would not be so rotten.
Yours Democratically,
S.O.S
(Shattered Opinion of Sanity)
I hear frequent tall tales of how India was supposed to be one of the greatest nations of all, of how we emerged from the colonial rule, overcome poverty, hunger, disease, established the world’s largest democracy, of how the students from our universities landed the best jobs in the world, of how Indians were rumoured to be the citizens of a superpower, and how there was a time when our growth rate was second to none and how (here’s the one with the greatest height) and how - for those who lost track of the sentence – there was indeed a time when there were equal opportunities for all.
Then, around three decades back, our fortunes took a turn for the worse. There occurred a paradigm shift, a policy that was initiated by the logically challenged. Then our education system and soon the entire social establishment went to the canids.
However, this tale is not about the digression of our society. Instead it’s the current pathetic state of affairs that we have landed in. Here are the few rules that have come up in the last few years. The rules have all been adaptations of Rule 16 (4), the rule established few years after independence that insisted on reservations for those sections of Indians who were not adequately represented. Soon, as standards reduced, grammar deteriorated and adequate began to be interpreted as proportional. Now there is 47% reservation for OBCs in all Universities, Central and Private Sector Jobs, 28% for SC/STs and another 15% left to the whims and fancies of the college/company. However, mind you, this is merely another type of affirmative action taken to uplift the downtrodden masses. It is of no consequence that quite a large percentage of the supposed upper class is in a lower income bracket. It does not matter if the supposed lower class lands up in the best institutes due to their caste certificate, you are a caste-driven fanatic if you are of the opinion that it is unfair that they have access to the best amenities due to virtue of being born in a family with a surname that entitles them to classified as “low class”
It was around two or more decades ago that up to 50% of seats were reserved in all Central Universities due to a minister with delusions of grandeur. Few years later, all private institutions had reservations. For private institutions to reservation in private jobs was no quantum leap, merely an incident that provoked a little bit of outrage, vied for print space in media reports and was accepted and taken in stride. Few minor changes then took place. Firstly, income tax was reduced for all citizens belonging to the castes and subcastes that Mr. BP Mandal has enumerated in his report in the 1980s. A system was introduced by which they got 10% discounts in all stores.
Then one of our many political maestros hit upon the idea, why not introduce reservations in politics? This too faced little opposition as no one wanted to commit political hara-kiri by denying the “socially backward” the right to be represented in the making of the laws of the nation. Now, every 3rd President must be an OBC or an SC/ST else we are not providing retribution to the people for historical grievances committed on their ancestors 5000 years ago by the ancestors of the elitist general class.
More rules emerged. Ludicrous yes, but some bordered on the verge of insanity. Like the one which stated that any backward class citizen who had an annual income greater than 27 lakhs, if his business crashed, he would receive compensation from the government. If a disaster occurred, the first to be rescued and rehabilitated would be the supposed posterior of Indian Society
The downside of having reservations was that when thousands got into universities by pure anomaly of fate, few passed. The worried government instantly reduced the education system by claiming that it laid too much stress on the brain of the youth. When this did not achieve desired results, the citizens of the backward class were encouraged and provided financial support to raise larger families so that the number of students would increase and the chances of a smart young un being born and capable of passing through the university was higher. In retrospect, many admit that might not have been the smartest piece of legislation but then, it was done by the people and for the people. With the result that now there were more students clamouring for less seats with more competition.
Any reader, who not being present in this wondorous time may wonder, why did the government not increase seats in universities, provide more jobs and privatize the airlines or the railways to provide more job opportunities? Well, when other nations noticed that the talent coming out from the top brass of Indian Universities was not up to their expectations, a supposed travesty of justice occurred due to which they lost faith in the Indian economy. Due to reduction in Foreign Investment, the Sensex crashed. It is currently struggling at around 8000 points.
Most of our budding industrial leaders left India to make their fortune in foreign lands. Duly accuse of being treacherous and unpatriotic, the finest crème de la crème of emerging India intelligentsia moved to other nations where opportunities were not denied by virtue of birth.
It’s a shame. The current scenario is reminiscent of Ayn Rand’s work – Atlas Shrugged where industry collapses. This is worse. The fabric of society into which we all were interwoven as one people in one nation has been shredded to bits by those who lust to reside in corridors of power.
Well, we had a debate in class about the current situations. When I laid across my viewpoint (which I had chanced to read in some old archive of one of a newspaper) that in 2006, when there 50% of the population constituted OBCs, and assuming atleast 0.25% grew to be of college going age, was it too difficult to find few thousand meritorious brilliant students from the OBC category out of the 13 lakh students? If yes, were we not undermining the intellectual capacity of these people? They are humans, born as equal as us. They do need to grow up holding crutches. They are capable enough to be given enough dignity to make their mark in society without the aid of a caste certificate.
If by some chaotic fluke, they weren’t then what was the point of including students devoid of intellect in an institution which would drive them nuts? Was the problem being addressed by simply laying down reservations or did the problem lie deep within at the very roots? On hearing this, I was accused of developing casteist undertones, being a bad influence on the fragile minds of other youngsters and sent to therapy for having a dubious psychological profile and unpatriotic thoughts.
As a punishment, I was asked to write a 300 word composition on My Motherland. The other students were shocked to hear that such a harsh punishment was meted out to me. Most textbooks after all had only 180 words on such topics. Well, I wrote this and poured all my angst, my frustration, the pity that a once proud nation was reduced to and a hope that in other parallel multiverses, the future would not be so rotten.
Yours Democratically,
S.O.S
(Shattered Opinion of Sanity)
posted by Thriddas Anorak at 11:58 pm
1 Comments:
i couldn't agree more....
and i think i'll give them [those who gave you the punishment]the punishment of reading this article of yours a 100 times.. or till they understand it[whichever is faster] and reproducing it on an answer sheer-verbatim...
till then this India can ROT...
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