When Exalted Editors Take to Petty Pandering

The Hindu has recently published a couple of inane editorials about the reservation issue. N Ram and co. stubbornly refuse to lend ear to the sincere demands of the agitating doctors. Instead, they keep harping that the strike is 'morally indefensible' and ought to be called off rightaway.

If the editorials had raised the plight of suffering patients, if they had reminded the doctors of their moral responsibility to not shirk work, if they had supported the Supreme Court's call for the withdrawal of the agitation, I would have found myself in solemn agreement. But the Hindu does none of these. It chooses to reel out specious sophistries to call for an end to the strike.

The editors repeatedly miscontrue the mere trigger to be the raison d'etre of the agitation. OBC reservation and the resulting decrease in general category seats is the immediate cause, nothing more! As the demands of the striking students clearly show, they are voicing concern about a much deeper issue - the rationale behind reservation and its efficacy in achieving any social upliftment whatsoever.

Instead of even considering this question, the editors of the Hindu choose to accuse the movement of being intransigent. They ask - the number of seats will be increased keeping the number of general category seats unchanged, why don't you go back to work? As an aside, it is clear that they do not realize the gross unfairness of this move - millions of rupees of taxpayers' money is to be spent solely for the benefit of the OBCs and the SC/STs. The majority, read the general category, will gain nothing from the millions being spent on infrastructure.

Let me add that what I have just said is irrelevant, even inconsequential. The real grouse is that this move has a fundamentally flawed basis. Our polity is guided not by principles of equality or upliftment, but by unabashed votebank blackmail. Instead of strengthening facilities at the grassroot level, the government has chosen brazen Chamberlain-esque appeasement in the form of reservation in higher education.

The predominantly rural backward population lacks access to a decent primary education. How on earth can this quota improve their lot? All it will do is to ensure the support of a sizeable votebank for the congress party. A poor Brahmin struggling against odds in some desolate village will now have to score 99.99 while a stinking rich city-bred OBC student will easily get away with 90% or even less. Is this the level playing field we seek? Is there any concrete scientific basis or even any quantifiable objective to this fettering of the 'upper classes'? In the age of globalization and liberalization, is such a retrograde step called for? As Saisudha pointed out to me, India now is akin to the America portrayed in Atlas Shrugged. The able and eager 'general category' youth have been left gaping as seats are usurped by eminently less-qualified 'backward' candidates. Pastures abroad never looked greener to the Indian student.

But all this is beyond the ken of the Hindu's exalted editors. The Prime Minister has promised to 'consider' the demand for an apolitical panel. Therefore, their editorial outrageously says, the strike should be called off! A humble analogy - At the height of the recent demonstrations in Kathmandu, let us suppose the King had promised to consider the demands of the people. Therefore, the Hindu would say, the demonstrations ought to halt at once! To my eyes, the Hindu has been irascible, unreasonable and irritatingly dumb in writing these editorials.

I should add that the Hindu opines, thankfully, that IITs and IIMs should be retained as centres of excellence without any reservation. However, it does not raise its voice strongly in support of this thesis. Instead, it trivializes, even mocks, the current agitation which, inter alia, is saying the same thing.