Reservation in India

When India became a free nation, our Constitution makers recognized the special position of the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes in our society. So special concessions were granted to them and a provision was made in the Constitution for reservation of seats for them in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies. The Constitution lays down that, keeping the efficiency of administration, the claims and the aspirations of the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes shall always be taken into consideration, while making appointments to services and posts, both in central as well as provincial governments. In the light of the above provision of the Constitution, a reservation of seats in the legislatures for the members of the scheduled castes and tribes. A certain percentage of posts were also reserved for them in government services. Besides this, care was also taken in making such reservations for the students of these communities with regard to their admission in various vocational, professional and technical institutions. From the day our Constitution came into force, such reservations and concessions were to last only for ten years but since then they have been renewed thrice.

In the beginning when such reservations were made for a limited, period, people were satisfied that justice was come to the communities. But the signs of discontentment among the people become visible when more and more castes included in these schedules and the backward classes were also granted protective discrimination with regard to their appointments in government services and also to their admission in various professional courses. There was little opposition to these reservations in the beginning but the new concessions and the repeated renewals of the period specified in the constitution were decried by the people. The issue of reservation of posts in government services and in admission to educational and professional Courses like medical, engineering etc. for the backward classes a storm of countroversy. People objected to it on the ground that it perpetuates caste sentiments and hinders social integration.

The principle of reservation posts has been justified on many grounds. Some argue that by providing incentive opportunity and resources to the weaker and neglected sections of society, it has helped in the national development. People receiving such benefits develop in them a sense of belonging to the society. It has been argued that these preferences help in acquision of such skills by the beneficiaries as to enable them to compete with those have already such resources. These measure also reduce gap between the so called higher and resourceful sections and the proper and backward sections of society to bring about economic equality.