Look Around

One of my teachers in school said once "In this country, if you have to secure a good job or seat , just being intelligent wouldn't be enough". Maybe true, with the extent of reservations being at 49%, it is not enough to be intelligent, you have to be twice as intelligent; a widely known fact to thousands of students and graduates in the country. The great thinkers of the country want to
remove all social inequalities in the country, because of the prevalent caste system, on the basis of which division of labor existed. The truth is, societies change, regardless of what the government does or does not do. I can't say what lies in the entire country, but i can very honestly recount the story of my village.

My grandfather's village, is a small one with a typical population of around 1500-2000. In my childhood, it was the perfect reason why the government claims reservations were made. It was divided into exactly 3 regions. The first region, on he highest land, consisting of the upper castes, consisting of priests, and the political persons of the village. If you even walk into the area, a
lot of questions as to whose family you belong, and your surname. The next region consisted of the middle class farmers, with small tracts of land. A lot of them employ a number of landless labourers in the third and most backward part of the village, with almost zero educated people and highly prone to health problems. The three parts of the village are highly distinguishable with plastered brick houses, limestone houses and thathced huts respectively. But all that has changed. In my recent visits to the village, I've been noticing a remarkable change in the divisions of the village. The entire upper caste region of the village, is no longer inhabited by a majority of the people, thanks to globalization. Most of their children who have settled in the cities are keen to take away their parents and to sell off their properties in the village.Meanwhile the conditions of the middle class farm have furhter been aggravted, especially because of decrease in incentives of the government towards farming. But, the most backward parts of the village have undergone a remarkable transformation. A majority of the people have taken up various forms of rented farming, in the fields of the more affluent , who stopped cultivating any more. Various businesses are being set up by the inhabitants of this section, including the wide spread use of commercial transport means. Some of these people doing small businesses have started a small assosciation and started to give out loans to the needy. Landless labourers have
decreased in number and those still existing enjoy high wages owing to the decrease in number of workers in the fields. It is even amusing to find out that some people make advanced bookings for labourers during harvest, but underlying these is a much more serious problem of migrations by the labourers. With various missionariees spread out in the village, and large scale religious conversions, without regard to caste, has further brought down the levels of caste distinctions in the village. The government undertaking of construction of pucca houses for everyone has reduced the distinctions in the anatomy of the village.Today, the political heads of the vilage are scattered throughout the village and comes from the more affluent people , regardless of their
caste or section in the village. Realization of importance of education is being observed by everyone, as they see the people residing in cities( of the upper castes) coming to village occassionally. However, basic health and sanitation has and had always been a major problem, although consciousness in people has increased, mostly due to people's assosciation with media.


Considering all the recent developments,which may or may not be uniform throughout the country, two points are worth mentioning.
There is much more difference in the standards of living between rural people and urban people than those of people within the village. Secondly, if we observe, only the implementation of government policies have made a change in the people's lives than the policies of the government itself. Honestly, i don't see a lot number of people benefitted from reservations that have existed for over 50 years, as most of the people in the backward section of the village are not educated beyond seconadry education. And,rather than drawing up new lines of distinction accomodating present social differences , sticking to the same policy of OBC's , SC's and ST's and what more, increasing the percentage of reservations, is beyond doubt, beneficial only for the greed of politicians. If government focussed more on increasing education, health infrastructure, than being idealistic and holding a section of people as backward forever , the picture of the village i've provided would have been quite different. Besides, social differences continue to exist, however advanced a society maybe, only difference being , now they will be based on economic differences and the area where they live, a much more serious problem than the earlier differences. There is no easy solution to this, and all we can do is to hope that the government acknowledges the changes in society at least now and strives to do better to the rural people. But isn't it expecting too much from the present politicians??