Mandal In The Jungle

Their caste-based occupation, relegated to the sidelines by modern transportation, consigned Kahars to the margins of society. Today, their traditional calling, romantically depicted in film, music and literature, is an outmoded quirk. For, Kahars have cast off their ritualistic burdens and taken to agriculture, labour and modest service or commercial work. They now seek an economic and political salience that a numerica­lly small, disadvantaged caste (around three per cent in UP) finds hard to come by.

Hence, in recent years, Kahars have tried to forge strategic affiliations based on social or occupational links with dozens of other castes. 바카라�Most backward groups, inc­luding Kahars, tend to remain socially distant from even other OBC castes who more or less share the same socio-economic status. As a result, even if we struggle as one to secure our rights, only a select few end up enjoying those rights,바카라� says Prakash Kahar, a Supreme Court advocate who leads one of many efforts to unite Kahars with members of other caste groupings such as Manjhi, Mallah, Nonia, Bind and Ravani. Altogether, Kahar argues, a united front of several dozen communities would create a pressure group of up to 20 per cent of the population. This would give their platform, the Kahar Mahasangh, clout enough to bargain with any government for jobs, civic amenities and educational services.

Yet, with a rejig of reservations for backward classes on the anvil, not just the Kahars but all left-behind social groups in Uttar Pradesh are at a crossroads, grappling with contentious choices. The trigger is the state government바카라�s announcement that it will subcategorise Other Backward Classes (OBCs) into three distinct tiers바카라�backward, more backward and most backward. Each tier will accommodate a fixed number of castes ranked by their relative deprivation. The tiers will be allotted fixed shares of the 27 per cent reservations earmarked for OBCs in government jobs and educational institutions.

Thus, for instance, if three subcategories are created, 13 per cent (of the 27 per cent) could go to the most backward groups, eight per cent to the more backward and five per cent to the backward. Which group gets what will determine whether they seek shelter and advancement from under the OBC umbrella or consolidate into caste groupings to satisfy practical needs.

바카라�Through subcategorisation, the government is in fact trying to drive a wedge within the deprived communities while app­earing to help them,바카라� says ex-Rajya Sabha MP Sharad Yadav. 바카라�But this ploy will do the government no good. First, because it is widely known that they have created no new jobs. Second, because the available quota positions are not being filled today. And finally because OBC subcategories exist in Bihar, for exa­mple, but that did not make OBCs fight or oppose each other.바카라�

In UP, OBCs consist of 77 distinct caste groups or 50 per cent of the population. Yet, within OBCs, a smaller number of castes, such as the Yadavs, Kurmis, Lodhs and Jats (18 per cent of the population), are economically and socially better off. The argument in favour of subcategories is that non-Yadav OBCs, such as Kahar, Lohar, Julah, Banjara, Dhivar or Gaderia, find it difficult to compete with better-off OBCs. If there is a quota within quota, the argument goes, they will be in a better position to compete for jobs or admissions.

바카라�At best, three or four OBC castes have benefited from reservations, and those are closest to the general category in terms of their educational, political, social and financial position. Members of those castes call us their brothers only when there is talk of division of shares among OBCs,바카라� says Kahar, while ­citing Bihar (where OBCs were subcat­egorised in the seventies and eighties and ­given some shares in the spoils of development and ­power) as a partial exception to this rule. 바카라�At the same time, whenever a com­munity accepts the 바카라�ati-pichda바카라� (most backward) label, some pol­itical party gets a readymade vote bank while the community gains nothing, No matter what nomenclature OBCs are given now, they are watching out for gaps between what is promised to them and what is actually delivered.바카라�

If the prospect of greater social distance, even conflict amongst OBCs, worries Kahar as much as less-advantaged OBCs being left behind socially and politically, the Yadavs and Kurmis counter the government바카라�s proposal with the logic of their own experiences: 바카라�The Kurmis are very angry with this government,바카라� says Sadhna Sachan of the Kurmi Swabhiman Mahasangh, a pressure group whose demands include a Kurmi CM or deputy CM in UP. 바카라�Because elections are near they have made us into Kurmis, but in the last election they sought our votes by telling us we are Hindus.바카라�

The Kurmis, an agricultural landowning community, make up 12바카라�15 per cent of the OBC population and are relatively better off despite economic stress caused by shrinking landholdings and job opportunities. 바카라�Kurmi voters can swing elections but only the three per cent community got a real share in power,바카라� Sachan says, referring to Keshav Prasad Maurya, the deputy chief minister and a Koeri, which is an OBC group that makes up 3.5 per cent of the state바카라�s population.

Though Kahars and Kurmis, for instance, stand on opposite ends of the economic spectrum covered by the broad OBC ­classification, they share a common complaint바카라�lack of political representation. 바카라�Anupriya Patel, a Kurmi, is a central minister but Vinay Katiyar has been sidelined, as has Ramkumar Verma, a powerful leader,바카라� Sachan says. She argues that if OBC reservations must be split up, the respective shares should be determined by their proportion to the population. 바카라�Or else, unlike 2014 and 2017 when 80 per cent of Kurmis voted BJP, now OBCs must unite against Savarnas like they did in Phulpur,바카라� she says.

Her reasoning is that Kurmis have a few highly-educated members but most barely finish school. 바카라�That is why Kurmis are crazy for secure government jobs. It바카라�s not as if all of them have prospered바카라�the poor will be penalised by subcategorisation,바카라� she says.

P.S. Krishnan, former secretary to the Government of India who steered the first National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC), defends the logic of subcategorisation on grounds of wide diversity amongst OBCs. The category includes weavers, carpenters, ironsmiths, fishermen, boatmen and landed peasantry. 바카라�Those who have no skills, land or education have not progressed. Hence the logic that there cannot be fair competition among unequals should be extended to reservations,바카라� he says. 바카라�Subcategorisation is absolutely essential because a nomadic group, a group previously classified as criminal and a landed caste cannot be on an equal footing. Tenants, landowners, peasants, artisans바카라�they each have different resource bases.바카라�

The Mandal Commission had considered subcategories too, but could not recommend it due to a legal bar that existed at the time. 바카라�Later, the Supreme Court opined that setting up relative degrees of deprivation is not unconstitutional, so the route is clear,바카라� Krishnan says. In Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar the subcategories already exist, he points out. 바카라�There are eight in Kerala, five in the other two states and Bihar needs more. The Centre has in fact been slow in doing what is necessary,바카라� he says, referring to a parallel ongoing central government effort to reconstitute the NCBC, whose fresh awards, also based on subcategorisation, are due in June (after two extensions to its deadline).

바카라�Our commission has been set up to decide where communities should be placed in the (central) OBC list and their relative shares. These are questions we have no answer for yet,바카라� says Dr J.K. Bajaj, member, NCBC. Other than the reconstituted NCBC, the government wants to vest in Parliament the power to include and exclude groups in the OBC list. The result of this (and the lasting echo of the statement by RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat during the Bihar elections against reservations on caste lines) is that a message has gone out to state political outfits that reservation is going to be used as a political tool바카라�that the Centre will propose inclusion and exclusion of communities as a way to corner opposition parties, not give real benefits.

For example, if the Centre proposes to include Marathas, Jats, Patels and Kapus among OBCs, then the political leadership of these groups would have to agree. However, this would deny those leaders the opportunity to rally behind these groups that aspire for OBC status and against the BJP. Also, if these new entrants are allowed into the topmost tier of OBC subcategorisation바카라�say, a five per cent shared by Yadavs and Kurmis바카라�they would crowd each other out. This would not matter to the BJP as much as it would to others, especially the Samajwadi Party. Either way, the BJP holds the trump card.

바카라�The idea behind creating categories is to first make each community separate and distinct, then give them a share in power,바카라� says Badri Narayan, director, GB Pant Social Science Institute, Allahabad. Also, by creating subcategories the BJP can take credit for championing the most backward OBCs: the MBCs and EBCs or extremely backward classes.

바카라�This can be seen as smart politics by the BJP and a lost opportunity for the opposition,바카라� says AK Verma, who teaches political science at Christ Church College, Kanpur. 바카라�Since the BJP is in power, MBCs are drawn to it. This was not so earlier. Conflicts among MBCs, OBCs are not new바카라�but to deny shares in reservations to MBCs on this ground would not seem fair.바카라�

Hence, the more successful OBCs will have to compete within a smaller OBC sub-quota while the BJP will try to bring MBCs such as Rajbhars, Nishads and Kewats into its fold. 바카라�Many MBCs are amenable to Hindutva politics today because no other political consciousness has intervened in their midst바카라�neither communist nor Ambedkarite바카라�except the RSS,바카라� Narayan says. To extend this argument바카라�if Mandal times bore witness to peak OBC consolidation, then their subcategorisation will be the nadir of OBC division.

This is why commentators believe the new categories can give Indian politics a fresh tweak. Now, OBC reservations exist on the principle that the entire unit is backward with only the creamy layer (based on income ceiling and family background) setting the norm for exclusion. 바카라�Yet, every year UP has been raising the creamy layer limit. This means the state is unable to find candidates to fill OBC vacancies unless more people enter the competition. In this situation, subcategorising while saying that dominant people are taking over the quota is contradict­ory,바카라� says Samajwadi Party leader Sudhir Panwar.

Is it fair, as well, that in order to give a poor Gaderia or poor Prajapati the benefit of reservation a poor Yadav will be denied the chance to compete? 바카라�Every OBC community has been given the constitutional right of inclusion in the category. The government is trying to divide and rule them via subcategorisation,바카라� says Sharad Yadav. 바카라�Even if it was a mistake of the opposition parties to not have encouraged MBCs and EBCs adequately바카라�will they now punish OBCs for those mistakes?바카라�

He argues that the government is 바카라�afraid바카라� to release the 2011 caste census data. 바카라�Because the two per cent (savarna) want to hold on to half the jobs. Undoubtedly, OBCs are now 60 per cent of the population. If this is revealed to the public there will be a big fight, which the government wants to avoid,바카라� he says.

Naturally, if other groups are included within OBCs, then dem­ands will arise to lift the 50 per cent cap on reservations. Till that point, the BJP might find it advantageous to create newer caste groupings in Uttar Pradesh.