Re: Opposing caste based census

This is in response to Shirish’s comments (www.jugshree.blogspot.com), who questioned what difference a caste based census will make in a country already riddled with laws and customs which make use of castes. I would like to point out that anything that stands firm and tall need not be good for the country. granted that caste system is well entrenched in this country, but I believe it is evil and would rather oppose it rather than becoming a follower. Please remember, even Sati system was equally prevalent and popular in this nation, but we are rid of it today. Hence, even though your argument is well reasoned, I choose to remain an idealist.

True, that the caste based identification is still very much used(or abused) in this country, be it a birth certificate or school admission etc.However, I oppose a caste based census because it will only identify the exact nos. of people of various castes. What will that achieve? It will only give greedy and unethical politicians the exact mathematics to exploit the majority / minority segments for vote bank politics. As a result, a lot of policies in this country will start coming in which will unjustly favor or keep out particular communities just to create an uneven ground for various categories of Indians who will then compete with each other to gain an upper-hand.

For example, diseases like dengue or malaria can affect anyone. But IF in a particular city, say 27% of hospital beds are RESERVED for Harijans, it will certainly make them happy and their leaders popular amongst Harijans. But other castes will feel restriction on their health needs and care and in turn, they will try to demand reservations for themselves too and the ever increasing quota system will:

a) Neglect the care of the really sick who needs priority attention

b) Increase corruption and red-tapism, and

c) in the end will only be benefitting leaders or lawyers representing individual groups.

Instead of the nonsense, if one simply runs the hospital and bed allotment as per medical requirement and necessity, the whole city will be undoubtedly served better.My fear is that a commonly available database of exact nos of people of a particular caste will only be misused by politicians dividing people on that basis and also maintain power since their caste-based mathematics will usually be bang-on. 

Do you want to live in such an India? I certainly don’t.

PS:

You mention instances when people doubt your wife’s credentials as a doctor due to absence of surname. Such instances may be a result of lack of public trust on the quality of doctors graduating due to reservations. I personally will rather judge a doctor on her qualification and experience rather than their surname.