Is Caste-Based Reservation Still Necessary In India?

Caste is another name for control. Caste puts a limit on enjoyment. Caste does not allow a person to transgress caste limits in pursuit of his enjoyment."

- B.R. Ambedkar, Annihilation of Caste.

Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar was a staunch Dalit leader and a critic of the Hindu caste system. Ambedkar was one of the ministers who supported the system of reservation of jobs in schools, colleges, and civil services for the Scheduled Castes and Tribes. The Constitution was adopted on November 26, 1949, by the Constituent Assembly. This was a ray of hope for all the depressed classes who can now look forward to better socio-economic positions and opportunities.

So, the question is: Are caste-based reservations still necessary in India? The answer is yes. It is still needed in India. According to the NCRB 2021 report, a total of 70,818 cases of atrocities against Scheduled Castes (SCs) were pending investigation at the end of 2021, including those from the previous year.

Similarly, 12,159 Cases of atrocities against STs were pending investigation, and a total of 2,63,512 cases of atrocities against SCs and 42,512 cases of atrocities against STs came for trial in court. Conviction percentage under the SCs and STs (PoA) Act in conjunction with the Indian Penal Code (IPC) remained at 36.0% for SCs and 28.1% for STs. At the end of the year, 96.0% of cases of atrocities against Scheduled Castes (SCs) were pending trial, whereas for Scheduled Tribes (STs), the percentage stood at 95.4%.

Reservation is a social upliftment program that ensures fair and equitable representation for historically marginalized societies. Reservations help to recover some of the damage done over centuries by oppression and limited opportunities to the underprivileged masses. It helps to topple the caste supremacists from power who limit opportunities to those they think are inferior to them. It creates the same moral high ground for both, from where they can move further together without one being at a disadvantage.

The Caste System

To understand why reservation came into power, we need to understand the so-called caste system first, which is practiced by indian society. The fourfold caste system, also known as the 'varna', comprises four categories: Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, and Shudra. The Brahmins are at the top of the hierarchy, and the Shudras are the lowest and also the 'untouchables'. This caste system made the people in the higher class oppress the ones in the lower class. This led to discrimination in marriage (a person belonging to the upper caste can't marry someone from a lower caste), education, jobs, and practicing untouchability, etc.

In extreme cases of violence against the lower castes leads to killing, rapes and community disregardation. This level of discrimination led to the proposal of a reservation coming into power. It is a tool against social inequality and injustice done to certain classes.

Caste-based Discrimination Cases in Modern India

In modern India, we cannot talk about reservations without talking about caste because reservations target those groups of people who have been marginalized and still are marginalized in society. The modern progressive India that we talk about is it progressive when these atrocities, which are listed below, are still happening? Can we ever call ourselves a caste-free society without any surname linking to the caste it belongs to? Will removing these reservations bring peace in this society, or will it stop the caste-based violence, or will it push the backward class further back, and will there be no future for them to see?

There have been many cases in India that show caste-based discrimination is still prevalent in India. For example, a Dalit student who was on his way to write his exam was dragged from the bus and was assaulted, or the case of a Dalit man who was tied to a tree just because he was suspected of stealing rice and was beaten to death. These real crime cases are proof that India is far from being a caste-free society any time soon.

Caste Keeps Reservation Alive

Castesim keeps the reservation alive. This is a debatable argument, but it's true that if caste-based violence and inequality had never existed, reservations would not have been proposed in the Constitution. Reservations were introduced in the Constitution because of the mistreatment of the lower caste Indians by the upper caste people. They were deprived of education and social inequality.

Caste-based discrimination is banned in India, but not caste. In modern India, caste-based violence still happens even after these reservations or laws were passed to safeguard the interests of the lower community. It has been 10 years since the reservation began. Did that stop India from being a casteist society?

The caste system, which is deeply rooted in Indian society and has been in place for centuries, cannot be abolished in a few years. There has been a community in India that has been historically marginalized, and there's this other community that has done this marginalization. There is no fairground; you cannot expect both to compete and have the same equitable results. You need to give a little boost to the marginalized groups; that's why reservations exist.

Conclusion

The ongoing issues of caste-based discrimination and violence in India, as evidenced by the NCRP report 2021, as well as the cases mentioned, which I have only mentioned two in this article, but the number is more than we can imagine. Caste-based reservation remains a vital tool for achieving social justice and uplifting marginalized communities. Despite the ban on caste-based discrimination, it is happening on a huge scale; it is deeply rooted in the caste system, which has been followed for 2000 years or more. Reservations aim to rectify years of oppression and limited opportunities for the historically marginalized caste, offering them a chance to achieve socio-economic parity.

Some may argue that it is because of reservations that caste consciousness is alive. Still, we cannot deviate from the reality that these atrocities did happen to a specific group of people who were from that same particular caste. Removing reservations will heighten the existing atrocities that are already happening on such a vast scale and will put that caste at a disadvantage again. Reservations ensure fair representation and facilitate the long-overdue empowerment of those marginalized communities.