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Is it really?Before you order a one-way ticket to Pakistan for my whole family, please hear me out.Muslims are among the most socio-economically backward communities in India. They rank the lowest among Indian religious groups on every socioeconomic indicator. A few data points from the Sachar report (2006)[1]:Only 3.6% of Muslims aged 20+ were graduates compared to a national average of 6.7%Muslims formed only 1.3% of students in the IIMs, 1.7% in the IITs at the undergraduate level and 4% at the postgraduate level.71% of Muslims work jobs without any social security benefit compared to the national average of 55%As the Muslim population percentage in a village increases, access to educational, medical, electricity and infrastructure facilities decreasesThe monthly per-capita expenditure of Muslims is Rs. 635 compared to the all-India average of Rs. 712.31% Muslims were below poverty line whereas the national figure was 22.7%Muslims formed only 7.2% of employees of PSUs and 4.9% of other government employeesOnly 3% of IAS, 1.8% of IFS and 4% of IPS service members were MuslimSome of the blame for this backwardness falls on the community itself, such as in the low education and work participation of women, but the level of government apathy cannot be ignored. Since independence, the gap between socioeconomic indicators of Muslims and others has only increased. In particular, scheduled caste communities which started off worse have caught up or gone better on multiple indicators due to reservation and other policies addressed at them. Part of the reason for this would be their low political representation[2].I read an utterly depressing article today about intergenerational mobility[3]. Whereas Indians in general including SC/ST groups did better post-liberalisation, Muslims have had declining inter-generational mobility[4]!Basically, children born to backward Muslims are most likely to remain in this vicious cycle of backwardness.In addition to these poor socio-economic indicators, there has also been increasing violence targeting them in the recent years[5]. There are instances of cow-related violence and lynchings every once in a while[6]. And now they have even started beating up Muslims in the name of love jihad. You can say that these are isolated incidents, but it does feel ominous when the culprits receive such obvious support of the ruling party[7] which keeps using us as the other to group Hindus against.So why is it said that India is among the best countries for Muslims to live?The question should be, who is saying so? I have mostly heard this from vocal right-wingers from India and they have two points usually.Muslims in India are doing better than religious minorities in nearby Muslim-majority countries. I am sorry, but is that the standard we are aspiring for? “They persecute their minorities, you should be grateful that we don’t do the same to you” is it? Just yesterday I read a Quora answer where someone was indignant about their Muslim colleague not being grateful for being permitted to live a normal life in India.Since Muslims are doing fine in India, they should shut up. Silently suffer whatever the majority is imposing upon them. Do not raise a voice about perpetuating cycle of backwardness and everything from “no-muslims-allowed” housing societies to mob lynchings. The moment you raise your voice even on a platform like Quora, this happens:I am sorry, it does not work like that. This is our country as well, a Muslim is as much Indian as any Hindu. Muslims deserve the fruits of development too and deserve to not be attacked in the name of beef and love jihad.When we are raising these problems that Muslims face, it is not because we hate India or want to leave it. We are Indians and want to see India get better, but what is wrong in demanding that the development of India includes us as well?Update:This answer has received an unusual number of comments (by my standards at least). Try to be respectful when you point out the flaws. At least no one has given me e-tickets to Pakistan yet, so that is nice. Edit: Got two tickets now.A major response in the comments seems to be that I am blaming the government instead of blaming Muslims. I repeat what I said in the answer, part of the blame goes to the Muslim community too. In particular, Muslims shouldFocus more on education, especially that of girls[8]. Instead of marrying girls off the first chance, they should be allowed to study as much as possible and later work tooWhen protesting, do it for something that can improve your quality of life like trying to get a school for your village rather than for fighting some perceived insult to Islam or the prophet[9]That said, I do not agree with the claim that Muslims alone are to blame and the governments share none of it. A group of backward people does not get pulled to the mainstream by itself. “Blind” development will disproportionately benefit those who are already well-off and only increase the inequality between forward and backward groups. Many seem to be strong believers of meritocracy that the solution to everything is hard work and the reason for everything is lack of hard work. I have to say that it is a naive way of thinking. All your success is built on generations of people who have come before you. In my own case, I am 100% sure that if I had been born to any of my parents’ siblings instead of my parents, even with all possible hard work, I would at best have been a higher secondary dropout or a degree holder in Kerala rather than an IIT graduate and EPFL PhD holder. Guidance, role models, the freedom from having to support your family all that matters. Intergenerational poverty[10] is a thing. When such inequality exists, you don’t even need explicit discrimination to keep a group of people downtrodden over generations. So when the child of a poor Muslim going to a bad school fails, it is much more the failure of the support system than themselves. Feel free to take ownership of your success and claim that nothing was handed to you on a platter, but please have some empathy towards the less fortunate. If you were born in a different family, with no difference in your attitude, you could still have ended up much worse off than where you stand. The government (we are a welfare state) has to take efforts to address the situation of backward groups — be they women, SC/STs, regional linguistic minorities or Muslims — to make sure that development does not merely enhance their existing inequalities.Many of the comments come from faulty stereotypes about Muslims. Let me address a few of them now.1. One major trope seems to be that “majority of Muslims send their children to Madrassas instead of modern education”. Even I was originally under the impression that this was true at least in North India. But the statistics in the Sachar committee report was clear : 66% Muslim children went to government schools, 30 to private schools and only 4% to Madrassas2. Some commenters have pointed towards polygamy and high fertility rates, even going on to claim that Muslims have thrice as many children as Hindus! The reality is far from the stereotype in these matters. From the latest data that I am aware of, only 2.5% Muslim women were married to a man with another wife[11] (compared to 1.7% for Hindus and 2.1% for Christians). According to the latest National Family Health Survey data, Muslims have merely 0.5 children more than Hindus (2.61 vs 2.13) and their fertility rate has declined significantly in the past couple of decades[12]. You might have stereotypes of Muslims with a horde of children in the back of your minds, but Muslims have progressed significantly in fertility reduction for such a backward community.3. Some commenters have been saying that Muslims were doing about as well as or better than other communities around the time of independence. Perhaps they think this way because much of North India was ruled by Muslim rulers for centuries. But the fact remains that the common Muslims were isolated from the rulers and doing quite badly. They were significantly backward compared to forward caste Hindus during the time of independence, doing only slightly better than SC/STsNotice how Muslims started off worse than the non-SC/ST Hindus and the difference only increased with time?4. A couple of commenters had a problem with me producing 2006 data. Unfortunately, I do not have any comprehensive recent data. I think that the government should keep collecting development indicators once in a while to ensure that all groups are profiting from it. But I do not see such an effort since the Sachar report (or perhaps it exists and I am not aware of it).Footnotes[1] http://mhrd.gov.in/sites/upload_files/mhrd/files/sachar_comm.pdf[2] Only 22 Muslims in 16th Lok Sabha[3] A study of inter-generational mobility[4] http://www.dartmouth.edu/~novosad/anr-india-mobility.pdf[5] Violence against Muslims in India - Wikipedia[6] Cow vigilante violence in India since 2014 - Wikipedia[7] Union minister Jayant Sinha garlands 8 lynching convicts, faces opposition flak - Times of India[8] Raziman T.V. (റസിമാൻ ടി.വി.)'s answer to What should Indian Muslims learn from the Muslims of other nations?[9] Raziman T.V. (റസിമാൻ ടി.വി.)'s answer to What is your opinion about PM Imran Khan taking steps against blasphemous competition in the Netherlands?[10] Intergenerational Transmission of Poverty[11] Raziman T.V. (റസിമാൻ ടി.വി.)'s answer to What percentage of Indian Muslim married males practice polygamy?[12] Raziman T.V. (റസിമാൻ ടി.വി.)'s answer to Is the high fertility rate among Indian Muslims a part of larger conspiracy to make India a Muslim majority country?

Anti-reservation liesThe court did not reject reservation in promotions as a right. The court refused to direct the government to (take steps to) implement a policy of reservation in promotion which allowed. It is left to the government to decide to do so.No SC/ST quotas for govt job promotions: Supreme CourtA bench comprising Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Prafulla C Pant said that the government was not bound by any constitutional provision to frame a policy for reservation in promotion and the court could not order making reservation in promotion mandatory.Referring to Articles 16(4), 16(4-A) and 16(4-B) of the Constitution mandating socially affirmative action to help disadvantaged groups, the court said that the states were not compelled to make reservation for SCs/STs in promotion.It further said that the provisions allowed the government to exercise discretion and provide for reservation only after collecting quantifiable data showing backwardness of a class and inadequacy of their representation in public employment.According to Article 16(4-A), nothing shall prevent the state from making any provision for reservation in matters of promotion, with consequential seniority, to any class or classes of posts in the services in favour of SCs and STs which, according to the state, were not adequately represented.If the government decides to implement it, no court can stop it. What the court said is that it does not have the power to direct the government to change a policy.This is another typical falsehood spread by the anti-reservation lobby. This is another in the long list of lies propagated by anti-reservation lobby such as reservation was only for 10 years, reservations are for poverty alleviation program.Reducing nepotism encourages meritThis move break the privilege caste hold on the bureaucracy, reduce the nepotism in government. It will increase efficiency of the government as more talented people from SC/ST/OBC occupy positions of power and will be able to develop our county. It will reduce the greed of the privileged castes of India and make government more efficient.Unearned promotionsHere is the effect of such nepotism.Figure: Break up by category of government jobs (http://persmin.nic.in/AnnualRepo... , pg 38)Group A - top bureaucracy is dominated by the privileged castes. They use this domination to control who are promoted in organizations - themselves. It is very common in Indian bureaucracy for people to be punished byUnfavorable postings: This would be remote locations without any modern amenities as a punishment (For example Haryana moves IAS officer Khemka again: 47th transfer in 25 years)Unfavorable assignments: Usually the assignments that control the flow of money are preferred for corruption. Departments with higher budget are preferred assigned to the privileged castes but ones with no power or influence will be filled by SC/ST/OBCs for keeping up the count.Unfavorable appraisals: Since most of the senior officers belong to the privileged category and know the caste profile by surname and interactions, they would automatically be given favorable appraisals. While SC/ST like Tina Dabi will excel in objective assessments like multiple choice questions, they will be discriminated in appraisals, interviews often be treated as corrupt just because of their caste.The privileged castes have built a sweet oligarchy in government bureaucracy to promote their own kind and keeping the Shudras, Dalits and Adivasis away from positions of power bywriting adverse confidential appraisal reports for under-privileged categorydenying preferred prestigious postings in citydenying convenient postings for family members (both working in government).abetting, hiding, overlooking corruption of privileged caste officersselectively highlighting minor offences of SC/ST/OBCs like having an early lunchbullying, gaslighting sincere officers, doctors etc.Calcutta HC’s Justice Karnan accuses SC of ‘upper caste’ bias over contempt notice - his crime exposing corrupt judgesdenying promotions/postings that should happen normallyThose who claim merit failed India for the 50 years since Independence. After increasing reservations, India is developing faster than ever before along with HDI. They offer no explanation to this discrepancy.Opportunities to SC/ST/OBC develops Tamil NaduTake a look at the time line for reservations in Tamil Nadu.Reference - Reservation policy in Tamil NaduWhen the bureaucracy has more under-privileged castes. the government focus changes to development issues such as education, nutrition, health care, electricity, colleges etc. and country develops.Notice the period in 1980 when reservations crossed 50% to 68%. This is the time in which the state progressed rapidly as seen in the HDI statistics below. Changes in the reservation policy in Tamilnadu, resulted in changes from a 'dark red state' to 'orange' state in 1980 to 1990.Reference List of Indian states and territories by Human Development IndexThis change was primarily due to the reservation policy. Liberalization started in 1992. The state progressed rapidly.Scuttling development projectsTamilnadu implemented several development schemes like the Mid-Day-Meal, free bus pass to students during this period. Unlike other states where the bureaucracy scuttled these schemes, TN’s bureaucracy which was had more under-privileged castes and the schemes were implemented with fairness and enthusiasm. Dravidian parties competed to out-do each other.The net result, when liberalization started, the state had good educated work force and development kicked off rapidly.Here are the results of such rapid development (please compare the progress made by other BIMARU states).Note: It take 10–40 years for profile of government employees to change from privileged to under-privileged from the time the reservation policy is implemented. Tamil Nadu moved from 40 to 69% in 1981. By 1990, the profile changed.Tamilnadu has the second largest GDP in the states of India. It has witnessed not only economic growth, but also HDI growth. The state of Tamil Nadu is a more developed and progressive state of the country.Tamilnadu is the most ‘urbanized’ big state in India - Urbanization implies that the facilities such as electricity, roads, water, medical care are available to the people of Tamilnadu.Figure: Showing 48% of Tamils enjoy urban facilities. This is a first among large states - the number - 1–7 are union territory or small states. [1]Compare the BIMARU states with low percentage of reservations and high reservation state of Tamil Nadu. Look at the indicators of development in state of Tamil Nadu.Note: All references from Wikipedia.Electricity93.4% of state is electrified - 2nd among large states.Institutional Child Delivery90% delivery in hospitals in Tamil Nadu. Remarkable for a large state.Vaccination CoverageHighest among large states...Low BMITN's mid-day meal program with eggs, ensured that malnutrition problem reduced.Fertility RateEmpowered women have better health care and lower fertility. TN is a leading state in India.LiteracyBIMARU states are in the bottom, TN is in the 80-85 range.Correlation does not rule out causationIndia with 77.5% open category saw slowest development since independence.India with 50.5% open category see faster development in the last 25 years.More reservation, more development, faster development, higher HDI. If objective measure of merit were consideration, there is correlation between the two. These results exposes the biggest hole in the argument that general category means meritorious candidates and faster development.As the state of Tamilnadu clearly shows, a tipping point is reached when reservations exceed 60%. This would tip the scales when 3–5 member teams discuss policies, resource allocation projects in government bureaucracy. Here the profile of these employee determine not on who gets promoted but also where resources are allocated.ConclusionThe state of Tamil Nadu shows that the development is closely linked more representation of the under-privileged castes in positions of power. It is important to represent them in government in positions of power.Reservation in promotion is therefore essential and important step. It has proven to develop individual states as well as the India as country. There is plenty of statistical evidence to prove it.Anyone opposing India’s development is an anti-national. Just as we needed freedom from the British who exploited us, we need freedom these bureaucrats who are exploiting Indians with nepotism, corruption and greed.

Copied from article in The Hindu by VASUNDHARA SIRNAT, RAHUL VERMAChanging the rules of the gameCitizens’ protests in the last few years signal a consensus among all segments of society that the “rules of the game” of conducting politics in India need to changeIndia is yet again on the cusp of a battle for deeper democratisation. The data from nationwide surveys have repeatedly shown that Indians increasingly view their elected representatives and political parties as uncaring, unreachable, unresponsive, untrustworthy, and unrepresentative. This overarching anger against the functioning of legislative institutions (particularly Parliament), political parties, and elected representatives has led to massive protests by citizens and civil society activists in the last few years. The office of the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) and courts took cognisance of the matter and delivered a series of verdicts to deal with legislators with criminal records, free flow of black money during elections, needless competition among political parties to announce freebies, caste-based rallies, and massive corruption implicating many legislators. Similarly, the emergence of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) — a non-party political movement — is likely to force mainstream parties not to be brazen about the “winnability factor” in allocating ticket to candidates with criminal records and family ties.Several commentators in the past few months have criticised the overzealous attempts by courts to clean up India’s party politics, and expressed doubts about whether the AAP will survive long enough in its idealistic mode to have any influence on the rules of conducting politics in India. We disagree with this view. Our concern in this article is not whether the AAP will succeed in the electoral battlefield or if these rulings delivered by the CIC and courts are an exercise in judicial overreach. We believe that citizens’ protests in the last few years signal a widespread consensus among all segments of society that the “rules of the game” of conducting politics in India need to change. We argue that even if political experiments (like the AAP) fail, they help substantially in moving the established norms to a new equilibrium. In our view, laws and rulings alone do not challenge established norms. However, the presence of a political party, mobilising voters on a similar platform, helps in doing so by significantly strengthening the legal process itself, by disarming those who would seek to scuttle such change.Legal decisions can never be permanent solutions for they are turned and overturned on the basis of interpretations of specific words/clauses of a statute or provision. Political parties and their leaders in India have few incentives to play by the rules. For instance, they are required to submit documents to the Election Commission (EC) about expenditures and contributions they receive. Many parties submit incomplete documents and others submit even more unbelievable documents. The BSP, for example, submitted a two-page affidavit to the Election Commission claiming that it had not received any donations above Rs. 20,000 — the legal limit above which all contributions need to be disclosed.To clean up the muddy waters, courts and the EC have stepped in from time to time. BSP leader Mayawati’s rupee garland was considered a campaign contribution by the EC and needed to be declared. However, such interventions and judgments have often fallen short of expectations and have been indicative of judicial overreach.Anti-Defection LawThe Anti-Defection Law was passed in 1985 and strengthened in 2002. This law is a concrete example that substantiates a limited claim of unintended consequences. The law succeeded in checking the regular phenomenon of unstable governments and horse-trading due to floor crossing by legislators. However, it played a huge role in encouraging the centralisation of India’s political parties. Legislators in India now cannot take a stand against party leaders or defy the party whip, and use their conscience to vote on a Bill in the House due to fear of losing their seat under the provisions of the Anti-Defection law. The second unintended consequence of this law is that a legislator cannot question the party leader for flirting with a possible alliance with both the Congress and the BJP while toying with the idea of a third front. Sweet deals between top party leaders — not ideological harmony, social constituency compatibility or organisational coherence —determine political alliances in contemporary India.Parties thrive on how successfully they can divide electorates and seek support, and voters reward or punish the party — its actions and inactions — at the next given opportunity. The problem we seek to rectify does not stem immediately from parties in their mobilisational role but in their role as institutions that link the state with society. This distinction needs to be analytically separated. We may love to hate political parties but the truth is no one has shown how representative government could work without them. Political parties are “necessary evils” and in E.E. Schattschneider’s words “modern democracy is unthinkable save in terms of political parties.” The word ‘party’ itself, as Giovanni Sartori emphasised many years ago, derives its meaning from the Latin verb meaning ‘to part or divide’. The role of political parties is to link the state and society by aggregating divergent interests. Politicians are not only office seekers, but also have interests and values stemming from various identities such as economic position, gender, caste, religion, region, language, and so forth. Parties in their mobilisational role use such social faultiness because it is inherent in their definition of why they exist.Political parties are the torchbearers of the representative character of Indian democracy. No other institution — NGO, the media, courts or the bureaucracy — that claims to represent societal interests has completely succeeded in accommodating marginalised groups. Empirical research suggests that civil society organisations and NGOs are dominated by social elites, especially the upper castes and middle classes. Ironically, not a single media house has members belonging to the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes in their top decision-making team. Similarly, among 88 Secretary-level posts in the Central government, there is not a single Dalit bureaucrat and in the last 60 years, only four judges belonging to the SC have become judges in the Supreme Court of India. This may give us a hint about why Dalit entrepreneurs have organised a separate forum (DICCI), rather than joining FICCI.We think that the AAP phenomenon needs to be understood in this broader context of changing norms of conducting electoral politics in India. Let us take, for instance, the experiment of India’s first national Dalit party, the Bahujan Samaj Party. The BSP started as a political experiment, initially had an electoral stronghold in Punjab, but subsequently emerged as one of the strongest players in Uttar Pradesh. Later, all the ills associated with political parties also afflicted the BSP. However, one cannot deny that it gave Dalits an organised political voice and a proper channel of representation in the electoral arena, so much so that now every politician has to cater to their demands for governance and it is virtually impossible to think in terms of national politics without thinking about the Dalit question. In turn, all types of institutions have displayed a greater willingness to incorporate Dalits and address their demands. While the situation still leaves much to be desired, the point we are trying to make is that if the Dalit question had not emerged through a mass politics of agitation, legislation alone could not have possibly guaranteed their incorporation into mainstream politics.Similarly, the entry of the AAP has deepened the possibility of renewal in India’s electoral arena. The party has successfully managed to alter the terms of debates and has even altered the rules of the game. It has shown that campaign finance can be collected transparently and declared even more transparently. It has shown that nothing beats people-to-people contact and that politicians should aim to serve the public and not the other way around. It has shown that nominations can be given democratically and has also demonstrated a willingness to comply with the norms of the Election Commission. In doing so, it has strengthened the reach of the Election Commission by paving the way for future legislation.Incremental processNow this is not to overstate the bright side of the AAP. It is also entirely possible that the AAP will be afflicted just like the BSP was with corrupt members, and perhaps in a decade or so we will no longer think of the party as a harbinger of institutional change. However, the argument we make is linked to the idea that it doesn’t matter if the AAP fails its own public. What matters is what it sets in motion — an incremental process of institutional change defined by the need to have a cleaner, corruption free politics. Because of the AAP, the standards of politics have changed and this is what we think is its greatest contribution. It may have moved institutional mechanisms in India to a new equilibrium where corruption is not acceptable and cannot be lazily rationalised.The Indian state has been consistently hollowed out, stolen from and weakened in capacity over the years by people chosen by the public to safeguard the interest of the very same public. The rise of the AAP has been surprising and dramatic and the detractors are many. It is possible that in the coming months, the party may not be able to abide by the high standards it has set, but as the BSP example suggests, the battle for some severe institutional changes in the functioning of India’s electoral democracy has begun. India’s electoral politics is a decidedly murky process, and it is so by design. This route is not a quick-fix solution, but the true meaning of democracy can be realised only when democratic ideals are deeply embedded in the practice of democracy.(Vasundhara Sirnate is the Chief Coordinator of Research at The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy. She and Rahul Verma are Ph.D candidates at the Travers Department of Political Science, University of California, Berkeley.)