06-11-2006, 08:38 PM
<b>Shourie questions very notion of quotas in new book </b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->New Delhi, June 11 (PTI): Amid the furore over reservations for OBCs in higher education, former BJP Minister Arun Shourie has joined the anti-quota chorus, egging on the judiciary to strip political parties of their populist cover once and for all.
In his new book 'Falling Over Backwards: An essay against reservations and against judicial populism,' he documents what he says are attempts by state legislatures and Parliament to bend the law for their benefit, and how the courts - including the Supreme Court - have been virtually ineffective in tackling arbitrary government functioning.
The book, which comes in the backdrop of the government's proposal to reserve 27 per cent seats for Other Backward Classes in higher education as well as a move to reserve jobs in the private sector, charts the history of reservations and and questions the very notion of quotas.
Shourie begins by quoting the country's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, who said quotas based on communal lines would lead to disaster. He then cites a number of instances to prove that "affirmative action through reservations" has done little to improve the lot of the underprivileged across India.
The former disinvestment minister justifies his stand after analysing more than 50 Supreme Court judgements, government archives and census reports of the 1930s and even earlier.
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How did caste-based reservations come to be accepted despite the fact that Constitution had forbidden it, <b>where did the figure of "52 per cent OBC population" come from, why were reservations at entry extended to promotions</b>, do the so-called "backward castes" really need special privileges, what has been the role of successive governments and why did judiciary allow this perversion of the Constitution, he asks.
For instance, he mentions, the Mandal Commission derived OBC figures from the 1931 census. That census did not define "caste". The Commission tabulated the "castes" and then assumed these were the same as "classes".
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In his new book 'Falling Over Backwards: An essay against reservations and against judicial populism,' he documents what he says are attempts by state legislatures and Parliament to bend the law for their benefit, and how the courts - including the Supreme Court - have been virtually ineffective in tackling arbitrary government functioning.
The book, which comes in the backdrop of the government's proposal to reserve 27 per cent seats for Other Backward Classes in higher education as well as a move to reserve jobs in the private sector, charts the history of reservations and and questions the very notion of quotas.
Shourie begins by quoting the country's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, who said quotas based on communal lines would lead to disaster. He then cites a number of instances to prove that "affirmative action through reservations" has done little to improve the lot of the underprivileged across India.
The former disinvestment minister justifies his stand after analysing more than 50 Supreme Court judgements, government archives and census reports of the 1930s and even earlier.
.........
...................
How did caste-based reservations come to be accepted despite the fact that Constitution had forbidden it, <b>where did the figure of "52 per cent OBC population" come from, why were reservations at entry extended to promotions</b>, do the so-called "backward castes" really need special privileges, what has been the role of successive governments and why did judiciary allow this perversion of the Constitution, he asks.
For instance, he mentions, the Mandal Commission derived OBC figures from the 1931 census. That census did not define "caste". The Commission tabulated the "castes" and then assumed these were the same as "classes".
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