Day 87 - Caste & Prejudice

So the Indian government has finally decided to include Caste as a section in the latest Census study. The people who come to take your information will also now ask you what caste you belong to and report accordingly. This is the first tine that it is being done after 1974, if I am not mistaken.

Opinions are divided over whether this is a good thing to do or not. Is finding out about what percentage of the 1 billion plus population of India is split by what castes good or bad? I guess only time will tell and we will probably be answering tis question best in hindsight. But let's employ a little foresight to it and try to predict what it will do to us. Or at least this is my blog so this I my opinion. Bear with me!

I have two intrinsic worries on this caste question. First and foremost is inherent DNA of 'jugaad' that is so Indian which when mixed with corruption and politics gives us a heady concoction of manipulation. Will the census study be fair and clean or I'll the various political parties and caste brackets try to influence the outcome in their favor? Will Mayawati try to ensure that the UP census shows that it is a state of OBC and Dalits so that she can stake a better claim to the legacy of the state in future elections? Will the other communities try to get the study to show that they are a minority or a major depending on what suits them?

And in a country that reeks of scandals everyday how do we ensure that the study is executed properly and is a correct representation of India? Will there be mass census of a village where the panchayat or the village head decides what caste the village belongs to maybe in exchange of some favors from a particular political party? I know I am being a skeptic but that is my main worry. Without the inclusion of caste this would have been a numbers game with no political party really interested to dig deeper. Which party in Indian politics has the foresight to find out how many youth are there and then pitch an appropriate message to the right target audience? The median age of our parliament is anyway higher than almost all other countries as compared to the median age of the population. Our country is young but we have all oldies running the government.

My other big worry is the perfection of the art of manipulation by our political parties. The government of India already says that the caste study could be used to determine the reservation policies of the future - not exactly in so many words - but the meaning is the same. After the census study is declared, will our politics change to match what the study shows about the backup? Will BJP suddenly start talking more for Jats and Dalits because the study might show that they are a formidable part of the population? Will the political parties start manipulating the results to show it in their favor or even change their idealogies to reflect what the study shows? Will be become more caste based politics as compared to more country and issue based?

But most important of all my worry is that we will become even more prejudiced as a nation. Yes,I said even more given that we already are a prejudiced nation. We have preconceived notions about everybody and we show that in our daily lives. We treat the vegetable vendor differently than the newspaper vendor or our driver v/s our maid or even the officer in our workplace as compared to the boy Ho brings us coffee. This caste study will make us even more prejudiced against some segments. We will start seeing people based on what percentage their community or caste constitutes our population. We will start treating the lesser percentage caste with more disdain and the larger percentage ones with more trepidation. Will we teach our children how to treat people based on these numbers? Will we worry about the future of our children based on these numbers?

I hope I am proven wrong. I hope that none of this will happen. And I hope ghat hindsight will prove me wrong. I hope that the caste card in the census will be used for the positive and not the negative. But Indian political history is not on our side.

Will the new young Indian treat this caste study in census as just another number or will try attach too much importance to something that should not matter?

Time will tell.........but it does worry me!