ALMOST ALL INSTITUTIONS – around 75 per cent, if not all – in our country are

reserved for the upper castes only, although we do not consciously consider it to be any kind of reservation. All the premier institutes are full of upper caste people despite the fact that they are only a small proportion of our total population. Why is it so? It is so because the caste and class are highly correlated everywhere in our country. I am not saying that the upper caste people cannot be poor or cannot be deprived otherwise, but according to the report of 59th round of the National Sample Survey the proportion of poor people among the Scheduled Castes (SCs), the Scheduled Tribes (STs) and the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) are many times higher than among the upper-caste population.

Traditionally, the inheritance of private properties takes place in our country primarily on the basis of caste. It is to be noted here that the land reforms have not taken place anywhere in this country except in West Bengal. Other kinds of deprivations such as regional deprivations are also largely dependent on it. It is just not possible for a privileged person to understand the kind of fight a person who comes from socially, regionally, economically and gender-wise deprived background has to put up with to be at par with the privileged class. We need to recognise that gap and until and unless the state cannot bridge this gap by providing equal opportunities to everybody to grow it has to provide reservation. The state – here, the state is the system not merely the government – has discriminated against 90 per cent of the population of our country on the basis of caste by making them uncompetitive.

True, the reservation alone will not be able to solve the problem of discrimination. Although, it cannot bring about any solution to a much more deep-rooted problem of patriarchy in our society, ladies’ seats are still required in buses till patriarchy is there. Personally, I am also not in favour of any kind of reservation. That is why I am opposing the already existing more than 75 per cent reservation for the upper castes, which covers merely less than 10 per cent of our population. Moreover