This inflation in the currency of reservations was accompanied by a fundamental obfuscation. Is reservation an anti-discrimination instrument? Is it an instrument for creating a middle class? For expanding opportunity? Or are we committed simply to mirror theory of representation? Each of these objectives rests on a different justification and requires different instruments. One of the most appalling consequences of current reservation policy is that it misidentifies the barriers to entry in higher education. It is a cliché, but one that bears repeating, that inequality in educational opportunities is not corrected by reservation: that requires a whole range of other instruments like better schooling. For instance, there is some evidence that, if we consider economic criteria, caste has negligible effect on your probability of being able to access higher education. Indeed we can say something stronger: even with reservation and low fees, lack of income remains a formidable barrier in accessing higher education. If this is the case, then economic empowerment through vastly more ambitious scholarship schemes than currently exist is going to do more for access than reservations.

Reservations, in their current form, are a cover for not demanding and doing things that will be the sources of effective empowerment. It is an astonishing reflection on the state of our democracy that not one politician, from any caste, is willing to say, “Junk this illusion creating opiate. Ask more solid means of empowerment.” The political response to reservation is corrosive, not just because it has the potential of creating a constitutional crisis, but because it is dangerous for democracies to continually peddle the politics of illusion.

... contd.