Transgressing Caste Indignities through Reservation in Education: Debunking Myths on Systemic Equity and Fairness in India

Abstract

The sociological and political issues of caste and the rule of law in the annihilation of its victims continue to be the reasons behind a surge of scholarly literature that has existed within the domains of public discourse. The researcher seeks to explore Amartya Sen’s conversion handicap thesis in the context of reservation strictly in higher education, followed by a brief relevance of Nussbaum’s human rights perspective in light of India’s international obligations as signatory and ratifier of the International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) as well as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), in 1979. This section makes way for an empirical enquiry into the failure of the governance initiatives towards capability building, by governance initiatives failing to provide for the gradual introduction of these communities into the social mainstream. The second section shall examine how the design and the model of implementation of the present reservation system fail to provide for adequate social justice. The third and final section shall sum up the major fronts where the government initiatives at ensuring substantive equality have failed, with a conclusion speaking about possible alternatives. The very purpose of this article is to debunk certain myths about the equity and as the degrees of equality that exist within the current reservation regime and the average disadvantage that a scheduled member faces today.