Cancer of reservation spells disintegration : Sumanta Sen
Statesman 30.11.08
But when a cancer enters one part of the body does it not spread unless taken care of at the very outset ?
Caste-based reservations, gender-based reservations, proposals for religion-based reservations and reservations within reservation and amidst all this the frequent calls from various platforms to remain united and the observance of a particular day in the year as National Integration Day. And now in Mumbai efforts to reserve the bulk of jobs for Marathis, a clear surrender to forces that are easily the most vicious in this country. The surrender is on the part of a leader of the Congress, which claims to have held the nation together for over a century. Where is India headed for?
Mumbai is portrayed, and rightly so, as the commercial capital of the nation. The city has been home to all, Parsis, Gujaratis, Sindhis, Bengalis, south Indians, apart of course from the sons of the soil. It is their collective effort that has built up Mumbai’s wealth. Even the likes of Shiv Sena patron Balasaheb Thackeray, his son and Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and nephew Raj Thackeray, now the leader of the breakaway Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) and their followers will not be able to deny this. But they want only Marathis to profit from that wealth, though the Marathi contribution to the creation of this prosperity can always be questioned.
But who will ask that question? The Shiv Sena and now the MNS (two sides of the same counterfeit coin) operate under the banner of save Marathi pride and others, like Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh (Congress) and politicians like them, are too scared to pull that banner down. Instead, these “nationalists¶ tread the same path to garner votes.
Mr Deshmukh told a television channel the other evening that he had to follow the law in dealing with Mr Raj Thackeray. His government is armed with a law to deal with terrorists. Why couldn’t that be applied against Mr Balasaheb Thackeray’s nephew after he had unleashed terror against non-Marathis? If the blasts at Malegaon and elsewhere were against the nation, so were his acts of vandalism which also sought to tear asunder the fabric of national unity.
The chief minister could not do that because over many years the Congress has allowed the Shiv Sena to grow and prosper, fearing to take action and pandering to populism. Yet, are all Marathis admirers of Mr Balasaheb Thackeray and his family? Election results do not reflect that. Yet the Congress decided to allow such a force to grow because of its constant desire to derive advantage even from slogans seeking to arouse base emotions. Now that the divisive forces have been allowed to acquire a larger than life image and on the eve of a general election the Congress is scared to take them on. It is also wary of what role Mr Pawar may play if it decides to be firm.
If you can’t beat them, join them. So Mr Deshmukh speaks of job reservations perhaps hoping to take the wind out of the Shiv Sena-MNS sail but actually strengthening their specious arguments. He knows that if in the process he can win for the party a few extra seats then he will be the darling of his party bosses in New Delhi. No questions will be asked about the dangers that face the nation.
Yet it is the whole nation that stands in the danger of being at the receiving end. The virus of parochialism spreads fast in a multilingual, multicultural country, particularly when sub-nationalism is not scorned upon, when diversity is hailed to the extent of making one blind to the damage it is being allowed to cause.
Even a tolerant city like Kolkata has seen, over the years, people blackening shop signs written in English under the plea that they wee seeking to protect Bengali. This is dangerous. Reservations, actual and proposed, have already divided the people into several boxes. To be an Indian means little in real terms, more relevant today is one’s caste, religion and language. And now efforts are on to add place of birth to the list.
Perhaps it is now too late to rectify the situation, even if the realisation dawns on those that matter that something should be done. They and their predecessors have always looked at sectional interests for immediate gains. The worst instance of this was the implementation of the Mandal report by former Prime Minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh. He may have had social compulsions in mind (though he could not have been blind to the political aspect) but the same cannot be said of the goons in Mumbai. What is worse is that the latter enjoy constitutional rights. Mr Raj Thackeray may well contest the next elections, emerge victorious and swear to uphold the same Constitution whose spirit he violates in much the same manner as his uncle. As do leaders of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Bajrang Dal by using religion as an instrument of spreading hate while secular India looks on.
Just as the meaning of secularism has been distorted in this country so it seems crass parochialism is being sought to be explained as just an aberration which will never be the rule. But when a cancer enters one part of the body does it not spread unless taken care of at the very outset? Who knows where the disease will manifest itself next.
(The writer is a freelance contributor)
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