Caste based census – Dividing India

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After numerous efforts by all ruling parties to disregard calls by various organizations and political parties for inclusion of Caste in the census, the announcement a caste based census in 2011 has fanned the flames of acrimony between its proponents and opponents once again.

I cannot help feeling amused by the well meaning but naïve comment made by Shri Amitabh Bachchan whereby he states that this census would give rise to caste based divisions and that he and his entire family would like to describe their caste as Indian. In a perfect world everyone would like to think and act like Mr Bachchan and India could thumb its collective nose at what is being perceived as a divisive tactic.

The truth of the matter is that the Indian populace is divided along the lines of caste, and its influence on all aspects of life, be it education, employment or marriage, makes any assumptions to the contrary naïve and injudicious. The recent agitation by Gujjars as they exhibited their desperation to secure the benefits of reservation available to lower castes illustrates the point quite clearly.

The last caste census had been conducted in 1931 and Sir J.H.Hutton had mentioned in his report at that time that “Experience at this Census has shown very clearly the difficulty of getting a correct return of castes and likewise the difficulty of interpreting it for Census purposes,”

I am sure that in a country where there have been numerous instances of people changing their caste for personal benefit, this census would come as manna from heaven. It would result in large number of people claiming to belong to OBC/SC/ST etc and leave the government with no foolproof method of verifying their claims.

In a country where caste based quota and reservation system prevails it is a basic necessity to accurately know the numbers of such people, however the absence of accurate records or data, augmented by inter-caste marriages, caste based politics and a humungous bureaucracy ingrained with corruption, renders any such possibility a pipe dream.

Under such circumstances, I will go out on a limb and suggest that all these reservations should be scrapped. The census should make every effort to accurately ascertain the earning capacity and living standard of every individual and reservations should be for the poorer sections of the society regardless of their caste or creed. This would not only have the advantage of ensuring that the benefits of state sponsored aid goes to the needy, but would also help in netting large numbers of people who are wealthy beyond their means. Performed diligently this process will be extremely advantageous to the taxation department and provide much needed inputs to the ambitious project of providing Identity Cards undertaken by Nandan Nilekani as well.

Ajay K Yadavalli

Bachchan flips the bird….

I fail to see the reason for the media frenzy over the photo in which the Bachchan family is captured showing the middle finger as a proof of their having voted.

While I understand that smart comments do make for good copy, but then again I feel it should be taken in the spirit of fun and should not be accorded too much importance. While this gesture could result in immediate lawsuits in the western world, showing the middle finger does not represent any obscenity as per indian culture and as far as we are concerned that should be more important for us.

For those of us who are so concerned that the Bachchan family behaved in contravention of the western morals, I would like to ask their opinion on the Indian practice of doing “Linga (Shivling) Puja” do they suggest we stop that as well ?