Opinion - Letters to the Editor   

OBC Bill

The Government's decision to introduce the Bill to provide 27 per cent reservation to OBCs in Central educational institutions in Parliament when the matter is sub judice, without having a concrete action plan on increasing the number of seats, is indeed unfortunate. Renewed agitations are ominous warnings to the nation to brace itself for another round of strikes and chaos. The Government should have taken all stakeholders into confidence before introducing the Bill.

Ramit Arora,
Patiala, Punjab

* * *

Political compulsions seem to have forced the Government to table the Bill in the Lok Sabha. It has only strengthened the divisions in a caste-ridden society. How can deprivation of a seat to a poor candidate belonging to the unreserved category in favour of a rich student from the reserved category be construed as social justice?

V. Krishnan,
Chennai

* * *

The article "Rethinking reservation: from caste to region" (Open Page, Aug. 27) is thought provoking. The present form of reservation does not help the most backward among the backward. Decades of reservation have had little impact on the lives of the people of India's most backward regions of Bastar, Koraput, Kalahandi, and Bolangir, where starvation, malnutrition deaths, sale of children, and bonded labour are rampant. The benefit of reservation is cornered by the less backward people from other parts of the country, and nothing trickles down to the most unfortunate and most under-privileged people of the backward regions. A progressive government would focus more on the lives of these citizens than on vote bank politics.

J.N. Mahanty,
Puri, Orissa

* * *

Reservation in educational institutions and employment should be extended to those who live in rural areas and urban slums and not to those who form the creamy layer among the reserved categories.

K. Gopal Reddy,
Anantapur, A.P.

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