Your opinion on reservations (Affirmative Action) in this case

[Arrian]

There is one thing about this argument I have never really understood. The percentage of Brahmins in the general population has never risen beyond three to five per cent anywhere in India. They have also never been significant landowners. Nor have they been in positions of political power for any significant length of time. Nor have they ever been economically dominant, even in the trades. They also do not have a martial tradition, unlike some other castes.

How, then, I ask, did this group manage to "oppress" the remaining 97% of the population?

Um... the elite is usually small. Though I know very little about Indian history, I doubt your assertion that Brahmins didn't hold positions of political power for any significant length of time (position of power are not limited to being Emperor or whatever. Being the power behind the throne counts). It just doesn't sound right... and I'll now have to go off and search for some info on it to see if it is, indeed, correct despite how ridiculous it sounds.

Assuming that all of your assertions are true, the answer to your question that makes the most sense to me is:

Knowledge. Having it, using it, hoarding it.

-Arrian

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian

Like I said, I skimmed your post. How did these "OBC's" (seems such an outrageous name, btw) get so... well, "B" in the first place? I assumed (not always a good idea) it was b/c they were lower castes who were disadvantaged.

That's the point. By no tradition metric are these OBCs "lower". Almost all OBCs are from castes against whom there was no social discrimination.

What has happened is that these were/are the landowners. Being attached to their lands in the villages, most chose not to go to the cities, and ended up staying in the more rural areas. Because new opportunities were created in cities, they lost out. This wasn't anyone's "fault", it was simply a twist of history.

So by modern metrics of education, income, and other indicators, they're "backward" compared to the city-dwellers. The point, though is, that they aren't really backward because of discrimination or oppression.

And even the income differential, as noted in the article, is something like seven percent.

As for the name: when we used to say "backward caste", it was meant to refer to SCs/STs (outcastes, untouchables, and tribals). So when these people wanted to become "backward" too, they had to be given some name. Because they weren't the "main" backwards, they were given the name "Other Backward Castes".

Originally posted by Arrian

I read that part. So?

I think what I have written above explains this point better. This is like lumping the majority of the population, and the normal population, at that, into an arbitrary bracket of "backwardness".

[Arrian]

So you're saying this is a rural v. urban thing, then. Hmm.

Incidently, my googling has failed me. All I seem to be able to find is screaming propoganda...

-Arrian

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by aneeshm


"Other Backward Castes"

I think that term shows there is still a long way to go in Indian attitudes...

[Arrian]

Finally, I was able to find a decent article on this...

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/04/21/business/QUOTAS.php

CapCom, v2.0, complete with very real, tangible classes (err, castes).

-Arrian

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian

Um... the elite is usually small. Though I know very little about Indian history, I doubt your assertion that Brahmins didn't hold positions of political power for any significant length of time (position of power are not limited to being Emperor or whatever. Being the power behind the throne counts). It just doesn't sound right... and I'll now have to go off and search for some info on it to see if it is, indeed, correct despite how ridiculous it sounds.

True, the elite is usually small, but I've never seen one 3% small. As for being power behind the throne - there hasn't been a proper Hindu throne in India for almost seven hundred years, not counting the Maratha Confederacy (which is the only even remotely relevant example, BTW, of Brahmins being in positions of political power for any time), so it's a bit of an academic point.

The Maratha Empire was built by the Chhatrapati Shivaji, and when his line became decadent, his advisers, the Peshwas, were forced to assume control to stop its disintegration due to internal feuding. They, of course, never overrode the Chhatrapati's authority. There are two military leaders in recorded history who are said to have never lost a single battle. The first was Mohammed's general. The second was the Baji Rao Peshwa. He built the Confederacy, and ensured a period of stability in India not seen for probably the past half a millennium.

In the Indian context, I think you need to revise your image of what constitutes an "elite". We have this idea of people who are rich, own lots of land, and have lots of power and muscle. What you probably may not be aware of is that the so-called Brahminical elite stayed that way more by force of popular opinion and consent than by coercion or oppression.

Originally posted by Arrian

Assuming that all of your assertions are true, the answer to your question that makes the most sense to me is:

Knowledge. Having it, using it, hoarding it.

-Arrian

A potentially valid point.

But I'd like to point out that knowledge was also differentiated by caste.

"Pure" or theoretical knowledge of subjects like philosophy, linguistics, abstract mathematics, literature/scripture, some forms of exercise, and other non-applied branches of study which people usually do "for fun and self-improvement" was the traditional province of the "Brahminical elite". Practical and applied knowledge, such as of the skills required in a trade, or a craft, were pretty much restricted to the respective guilds of professionals who all came from that particular sub-caste (it defined profession).

So a Brahmin knowing anything about, say, iron working, or forging, or weaving, or something of that nature, would be rare, and would probably know less than one who was born into it. Education was centralised through the "elite" only insofar as you wanted to pursue abstract and, at that time, vocationally pointless studies. To earn a living, you had to do something else.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by snoopy369


I think that term shows there is still a long way to go in Indian attitudes...

As I said, when these group of people - who aren't traditionally backward in any sense anyway - wanted the tag "backward" to gain reservation benefits, there had to be a way of distinguishing them from the ones we already referred to using the word "backward". So the term OBC. Nothing pejorative about it.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian

So you're saying this is a rural v. urban thing, then. Hmm.

-Arrian

Maybe, but not so much.

It's more like "history screwed me over, so the world owes me something back" type of thing. The OBCs were never discriminated against socially or otherwise. It simply turned out that being attached to land in a village, and not leaving when you had the choice, wasn't, in hindsight, such a wise decision. But is anyone really to blame for that?

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by aneeshm


"Other Backward Castes"

Whoa, whoa, whoa....whoa, whoa. WTF? Is this somehow considered not offensive?

[Arrian]

Let's assume then that there was no oppression. Let's just look at the present inequity (rural v urban).

What would YOU do about it, if anything?

-Arrian

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by aneeshm


As I said, when these group of people - who aren't traditionally backward in any sense anyway - wanted the tag "backward" to gain reservation benefits, there had to be a way of distinguishing them from the ones we already referred to using the word "backward". So the term OBC. Nothing pejorative about it.

Sorry, missed this post when I made my last one. This sure clears it up - in no way whatsoever.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Kontiki


Whoa, whoa, whoa....whoa, whoa. WTF? Is this somehow considered not offensive?

Yes, actually, in this context. It's meaning is something like "economically disadvantaged."

In Indian economic-speak, "backwards" means "less economically developed," and is applied to social groups, geographic regions, industries, etc.

[Arrian]

LS, care to weigh in on the issue at hand?

The rest of us are blind men trying to understand a picture drawn by the one-eyed king. If that makes any sense...

-Arrian

[LordShiva]

I don't support teh reservations policy, either. Everybody focuses on teh (also unwelcome) possibility of "reserved" seats being filled by unqualified individuals, but I think as big a problem is teh possibility that they're filled by teh elites within teh "backward" groups. There's enough economic and social mobility in India that teh relatively successful individuals then cakewalk into teh best schools because they aren't held to teh same standards as everyone else.

[snoopy369]

The problem I see here is that you have a number of assumptions:

1. There will not be enough qualified minority candidates to fill the slots; generally this is not true in the USA, although I don't know Inda specifically. I would venture to guess that it is not as bad as the anti-reservation crowd would make it seem.

2. The qualification bar is set appropriately. If there are a large amount of qualified non-RC folks (more than there are seats), then the bar will be by default raised in order to exclude enough to define a properly sized class. Say you have an entrance exam where 100 is a perfect score. If 80 is 'Has a good probability of graduating in 4 years', and 92 is 'Limits size of class to 4000 students, as required by facility space and such', then currently the bar is 92 - but that is far higher than you would define 'unqualified' appropriately (likely will graduate, the reasonable definition thereof).

2) and 3) are of course necessary corollaries of 1) - if 3) was not the case (spaces must be left unfilled), then it is trivial to imagine that they will simply say "Hmm, oops, we don't have enough folks to fill the RC spots, so sorry, must fill with non-RC students now" as soon as possible, and not make any effort (advertisement etc.) to fill the RC slots.

I don't generally like quotas myself, and don't think they are generally appropriate in the US except in very extreme circumstances; but I don't know that I would have a problem with it in India, although I certainly would have to learn more about India to be certain of that. From what relatively little I've seen, I think I would, anyway; and from the one personal case I've known - one of my GF's co-students was of a somewhat lower caste than his wife, and his family shunned him as a result, to the point they came to the US and fairly rarely go back - I don't necessarily think the caste discrimination is gone, and it may be necessary. I certainly think that sometimes it is good for society to ensure that underprivileged groups - not necessarily discriminated against, but in general groups-as-defined-by-birth that mean you have less or no chance of upward movement. It's complicated in some countries, like the US, because being 'black' does not deny you upward movement; but being 'inner-city black' does generally (because of the circumstances of growing up in the inner city). It doesn't deny it 100%, but the odds of success are far, far lower. The same may apply in India; the 'OBC' as you define them may not have been 'discriminated against', but they do have less of a chance of success (due to their farmer roots) and it is good for society for them to become educated and successful, so that you don't have more and more of a separation between rural and urban, or whatnot.

Ultimately, that's what is at issue here. If you have a solely merit-based system (even assume no effect of money, which is assuming a lot), during the course of time you will find a larger and larger gap between those who are educated, and thus educate their children, and those who are not, and do not (as effectively) educate their children. It may well be by their choice, in fact, but that does not make it any more good for society (and it's not the child's fault, after all). The separation in the US between 'rich' and 'poor' is, in my opinion, largely a separation of 'educated' and 'under/uneducated' - because education leads to wealth, or at least somewhat - and changing that would go a long ways towards changing the opinions of the general population toward the country as a whole.

In the US this is fought with aggressive social programs (both governmental and charitable) towards educating the inner city students (because this is where OUR divide is); many schools give some preference (not outright quotas, but a slight preference) to folks from inner city schools nearby, especially state schools, and a lot of funding is available for them; but unfortunately that is still not enough, here. We have to find our own solution.

In India, the problem is more profound, because of the more significant barriers both culturally and geopolitically, and because of the generally increased poverty divide (the difference between rich and poor in the US is the difference between working 60 hours a week to feed your family, and working 40 hours a week to pay for your Lexus; in India this is more profound, as the difference between starving and being well off).

You certainly wouldn't argue, I hope, with the concept that it would be better for India if all of its people were educated, rather than only a subset being educated with the rest being uneducated? The way you get to the point where everyone is educated, is to ensure everyone has access to education, particularly in those areas where it is less available or less . Enhancing access to education in those areas is vital and necessary to ensure the population as a whole in those areas moves, slowly, towards being more educated - and towards believing in education.

Quotas are one answer for this, and a severe one certainly, but if the quotas are set appropriately they will not fall short of qualified students. Setting appropriately of course is the key... but if the other options don't work, or are unlikely to work, then they are one option that could work for this. Fixing them so there is no social bias against people who came in on a quota is a big problem, of course, but that's for the society to deal with