Saturday, May 27, 2006
Recently (may 28th 2006) I read the "swaminomics" that comes in TOI (pg 12). It was awesome. The "swami" guy rocks !!!!
Here's how it somewhat goes....
"I'm afraid their (anti-reservationists) notion of fairness and merit is dead wrong. Rewarding students with the highest marks benefits the people born in the right families, not the most intelligent or meritorious. I don't want to cast stones at others. So allow me to prove that I myself am an unjust beneficiary of an unjust system. I have a pretty good track record. I got stellar marks in school and topped my college class. As a journalist I rose swiftly to become editor of the Financial Express and later The Economic Times, the country's two biggest financial dailies. I had no political or business godfather: I rose on merit.
Some years ago I did a quickie IQ quiz in a magazine. The result said that I had an IQ of 130-135, a very high score, and that only 3% of people had higher intelligence. That made me feel good of course.
But consider this. India has a population of 1.1 billion, of which the workforce is 400 million. Three per cent of 400 million is 12 million people. So, in a truly meritorious society, 12 million people should have a higher position in the workforce than me.
That is not the case. India has at the most 2 million top managers and professionals. Where, then, are the 12 million super-intelligent people? Many are labourers or street hawkers. The canteen boy who brings me tea may be more intelligent than me and so too may be the man shining shoes on the roadside. But they were born in the wrong family, and never had access to good education or economic opportunities.
We got good marks because we had the most educated parents, the best books, and went to the best schools and colleges."
But Mr. Swami.....i have a question to ask you....
"Is that canteen boy, or the man shining shoes on the roadside, neccesarily be of a SC/ST/OBC class ?? Can't they be the sons of a brahmin ?? If they are....won't the quotas badly affect them ??"
Got an answer ??
Here's how it somewhat goes....
"I'm afraid their (anti-reservationists) notion of fairness and merit is dead wrong. Rewarding students with the highest marks benefits the people born in the right families, not the most intelligent or meritorious. I don't want to cast stones at others. So allow me to prove that I myself am an unjust beneficiary of an unjust system. I have a pretty good track record. I got stellar marks in school and topped my college class. As a journalist I rose swiftly to become editor of the Financial Express and later The Economic Times, the country's two biggest financial dailies. I had no political or business godfather: I rose on merit.
Some years ago I did a quickie IQ quiz in a magazine. The result said that I had an IQ of 130-135, a very high score, and that only 3% of people had higher intelligence. That made me feel good of course.
But consider this. India has a population of 1.1 billion, of which the workforce is 400 million. Three per cent of 400 million is 12 million people. So, in a truly meritorious society, 12 million people should have a higher position in the workforce than me.
That is not the case. India has at the most 2 million top managers and professionals. Where, then, are the 12 million super-intelligent people? Many are labourers or street hawkers. The canteen boy who brings me tea may be more intelligent than me and so too may be the man shining shoes on the roadside. But they were born in the wrong family, and never had access to good education or economic opportunities.
We got good marks because we had the most educated parents, the best books, and went to the best schools and colleges."
But Mr. Swami.....i have a question to ask you....
"Is that canteen boy, or the man shining shoes on the roadside, neccesarily be of a SC/ST/OBC class ?? Can't they be the sons of a brahmin ?? If they are....won't the quotas badly affect them ??"
Got an answer ??
Saturday, April 08, 2006
I'm a brahmin...and i'll blame fate for that. The return of Mandal's ghost, i can clearly see, would create chaos soon. With premier institutes like IITs/IIMs having 49.5% reservation, life's gonna be hell for the "normal" people.
Recently i read that for every seat in the IIT, there are 60 students competitng. Now this reservation would mean, 120 "non-previleged" people stuggling for 1 seat. Whereas for the "previleged", the competition reduces to 30 ppl per seat!!!
Can't anyone in India, fight a fair fight ANYWHERE ???? reservations, Reservations, RESERVATIONS !!!! be it for girls, lingual communities, OBCs, STs, SCs, NTs...in the end, the open category is left with almost nothing. Why did VP Singh clear the Mandal Commision report some 20 years ago ??? All these problems wouldn't have even arised.
Once in my class, the teacher asked who all of us were "backward castes"...a few raised hands. They were given a form and were told that there would be a fee-concession for them. There was a girl in my class who came to school everday in a cheuffer-driven Mercedes, and lived in a bungalow worth 60 lac (thats just an estimate). Guess wat....even she took the form!!! On the other hand...there was a tamil brahmin whose dad spent his last penny to educate his son...he got no such help! Why ??? Coz he was a brahmin!
What kind of justice is this?? Just because brahmins harassed the "backward" ppl for some 2000 years, would OBCs and SC/STs do the same for 2 milleniums from now ?????????
And again the brahmins would get back at them....don't laugh....this is how things are in India!! The people at the top lack sense, those at the bottom lack a voice!!
I can see some mass-movement like in Rang De Basanti coming up soon...coz the govt has gone TOO far!! Or there should be reservations for brahmins!! Any takers ?
