Reservation in the corporate sector - II

By Gail Omvedt

WHILE RESERVATION in the corporate sector is now a very strong possibility, a major factor hampering all programmes of social justice in India has been their extremely reluctant acceptance by the ruling elite. In spite of Constitutional guarantees and official policies, ideas are still widespread that somehow ``reservation'' and ``merit'' are opposites, and that programmes to achieve ``social justice'' will slow down the development of a truly open, caste- free, merit-based society.

The reality is that in a caste (or race)-affected society, only by recognising the disabilities of caste or race can true openness and mobility be achieved. In a genuinely open and dynamic society, people of talent from every social group, and from rich and poor alike would have a chance to rise to the top. Such a society, however, has never truly existed in India; it exists only as aspiration and hope. It has never truly existed in the U.S. either, which is why programmes of ``affirmative action'' have had to be taken up there why the fight for racial justice still goes on. For that matter, nearly every country in the world has some form of discrimination, and the upcoming United Nations Conference on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination in South Africa indicates that the effort to build a world-wide open society still has to go on.

In India, the barriers to openness and merit have taken two main forms, that of patriarchy or gender discrimination and that of caste discrimination. Since the Indian form of patriarchy is largely affected by caste, we focus on caste discrimination here. It is easy to understand how in the past birth was a determining factor in a person's life chances: those of castes considered ``low'' had little right to education, little political power and small access to property. Those classified as ``untouchable'' were even worse off than the ones considered ``shudras'' in the official varna classification; they had no land, were excluded from participation in nearly all public spheres of life, had not even the glimmerings of a right to education, and had work opportunities limited to the most polluting and arduous jobs.

But social justice and the creation of an open society is not really about the past; it is about the present and the way discrimination operates today. India has moved ahead in many ways in the 20th century; it has opened up education and employment opportunities. Yet caste continues to be a determining factor in social life, and caste and kinship networks very often play a major role in access to employment. People of ``low'' castes, and particularly the ex-"untouchables`` still are deprived in many areas of rights to equal participation in public life in simple things such as the right to drink tea in a public tea shop - leave alone the question of owning the shop!

Employment is only partly the result of merit even in examinations and interviews; it has a large element of ``influence''. And for those trying to run businesses, even very tiny ones, the role of influence and access to power is even greater. These are direct factors of discrimination; indirectly, the limited spread of education and the vast discrimination in land ownership and property rights means that Dalits and the former ``Shudra'' castes (especially those classified as ``most backward'') do not even share the same starting line as those from families and castes who have as background generations of education, intellectual and enterpreneurial orientation and the economic resources to back it up.

Those industrialists who have talked about a ``level playing field'' for Indians in the sphere of international business competition, who have wanted support to compete with multinationals, have rarely publicly discussed the issue of how company ownership and company employment works in India. While the sociological data on caste and economic achievement is rather minimal, what studies we have show a heavy domination of upper castes. Strikingly, Brahmans seem to be outdoing even the traditional ``bania'' groups in industry today! Not only are people such as Mr. Gurudas Deshpande and his brother-in-law Mr. Narayan Murthy among the richest of Indians, but a study by Santosh Goyal of the caste composition of top corporate officers in 1979-80 showed that out of 2082 whose caste could be identified (of a total of 3129), 858 or 41.2 per cent were Brahmans; Khatris and Vaishyas were a poor second and third with 18.5 per cent and 17.9 per cent. Only 4.2 per cent were ``Shudra'' of any type. It is doubtful if this situation has changed significantly.

Many of the readers of this article will, consciously or unconsciously, continue to think that such a situation has come about because in fact people from the ``upper'' castes are more skilled, more talented. There is still even a tendency to think in genetic terms, in spite of the fact that nearly all scientific studies show little ``natural'' or ``biological'' distinction among different social groups. In fact, it might be said that if there is a genetic distinction between ``upper'' and ``lower'' castes - which would assume that there has been almost no intermingling of genes between the two groups over centuries - the advantage would be for the latter: the arduous life that the deprived sections have faced would mean that only those who are stronger and more intelligent would survive to pass on their genes! However, there is little evidence for any such separation in India, rather there is evidence for a good deal of intermingling between social groups in spite of formal caste barriers.

What this means is that the apparent difference in ``intelligence'' and ``achievement'' between ``upper'' and ``lower'' castes is a result of social factors - of poverty, ill health, lack of education and all the other factors that have served to smother the abilities and potentials of people from Dalit, Adivasi and OBC backgrounds. The result is that those from ``higher'' caste backgrounds, with long traditions of education and intellectual activity behind them, have advantages in developing their potential that the masses of people do not have. This situation means that there is a vast wastage of ``human resources'' in India. It should be of concern not only to Dalits and OBCs themselves, but to any true nationalist.

It is often argued that globalisation means that issues such as ``social justice'' and programmes to develop the talents and skills of the deprived no longer have relevance. But the opposite is true. A closed-in nation with little involvement and trade with the rest of the world can afford to move along slowly, to stagnate, to let the talent of its vast human population go to waste while a few take on responsibility for ``guiding'' the society. But an open nation has to stand the test of competitiveness. And the fact is that trying to compete with so much human deprivation continuing to exist is like trying to engage in trade or become a world power with a population of only a couple hundred million, instead of a billion energetic, talented, people.

This is why programmes of social justice, including the universalisation of education, access to property and resources, and the ``talent search'' which we otherwise describe as reservations, all of them essentially programmes to develop the talents and potentialities of the entire population, should be of concern not only to Dalits and other deprived groups, but to policy-makers and business leaders as well.

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