Dismantling Reservation, Upkeeping Meritocracy
Youth For Equality (YFE) works towards creating a casteless, secular and merit-based society by advocating for equal opportunities for all citizens.
YFE’s agenda is dismantling all forms of reservation through gradual reformation and upholding meritocracy. This includes:
Exclusions of all Muslims and Christians from the OBC and ST list as they are not socially backward.
Periodic Review of the OBC, SC and ST list once in 5 years to exclude those castes which were wrongly included.
Stringent implementation of creamy layer principle to exclude better-off sections from the ambit of reservations.
All public welfare schemes and financial assistance like scholarships, coaching assistance, hostel facilities should be caste neutral.
Casteless, Secular Society
No caste based reservation
Define deprivation without caste
Education for all
Health for all in an healthy environment
Employment for needy
Transparent, corruption free governance
Establish true democracy
Strengthen nationhood
Promote excellence: Build India a superpower
Casteless Society
Casteless society i.e. society where there is no discrimination on the basis of birth mark. The Indian Constitution guarantees equality to all citizens and thus establishes a rule of Non-discrimination by the state in any manner. It ensures and inures the state to treat all citizens equally and allow equality of status and opportunity to all and specifically provides that discrimination on the basis of religion, sex, color, caste, race or the place of birth etc are impermissible. The pious objectives with which our fore-fathers decided and embarked upon the framing of the Constitution – Secularism was one of the guiding principles. Secularism entails not just religious but also casteless egalitarian society. The high objective and the final goal was to convert a society fragmented on the lines of religion, caste, economic status etc into a homogenous society where identification of a person was not on the basis of the religion he professes or caste he belongs to but was on the basis of what he is or what he has made himself into. This is aptly clear from the statement of Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru made by him on the floor of the Lok Sabha on 13.6.1951. He said “After all the whole purpose of the Constitution as proclaimed in the Directive principles is to move towards what I may say a casteless and classless society” – (Lok Sabha Debates Vol XII-XIII (Part II) Page 9830-31). The caste system is the greatest hindrance in the way of our progress towards an egalitarian society and a strong nationhood. On 25th November, 1949, in Constituent Assembly, Dr Ambedkar spoke: “.In India there are castes. The castes are anti-national. In the first place because they bring about separation in social life. They are anti-national also because they generate jealousy and antipathy between caste and caste. But we must overcome all these difficulties if we wish to become a nation in reality. For fraternity can be a fact only when there is a nation. Without fraternity equality and liberty will be no deeper than coats of paint “
No caste based reservation
We oppose caste based reservation policy which promotes only a very small section of the society while leaving others deprived. Caste-hatred in the country will increase, if the present policy will be implemented, leading to aggravation of tensions as the government itself consistently identifying and certifying who is a lower caste and who is not. The quota system, created to facilitate the poor will ends up wrongly being utilized by children of rich, which includes politicians, ministers, businessmen, landlords and high class government officers belonging to specified caste. Why we are against caste based reservation?
Define deprivation without caste
Let this be stated at the outset that no one, no Indian, can be, or is, opposed to securing a just and respectable life for the poor and deprived fellow countrymen. The opposition to the policy of Reservation stems basically from a growing awareness that the ruling political class is pursuing this policy not out of either real sympathy for the deprived or out of a concern for the national interest. It has increasingly become clear that politicians of various hues have ceased upon this instrument to perpetuate their power and pelf by dividing the society along caste or religious lines and creating ‘captive boroughs’ in the form of vote banks. It is not our intention to restrain the government from carrying forward its social obligations. The emphasis is on the manner in which the government wants to go about this task. Youth For Equality, herein, do not intend that the government ends its task of upliftment of the down trodden but is aggrieved by the manner in which the government seeks to identify the down trodden, and the steps used for their upliftment. Deprivation not caste.
Education for all
Education for all with special emphasis on women and children education. As this is the root cause behind many social problems. Our special emphasis is on women and child education as mother is the first teacher of a child and if you teach a woman you teach one whole family. The level of primary and secondary education must be boosted. All the problems start from primary level itself, if a student does not have a strong base, then he or she cannot complete higher education successfully. The government should make effort to uplift backward classes by strengthening the educational base of these classes at the primary level. The government should start a campaign to ensure that students from all sections of society are encouraged to pursue studies at least till 12th standard. The number of seats in premier institutes may be increased, but then the quality of education should not be hampered. To attain this, it will be necessary to increase the teaching faculty as well along with the infrastructure. The unavailability of seats is not as big a problem to the SC/ST/OBC as their financial crunch is. Assistance may be provided in the forms of scholarships. The expenditure on higher and technical education is 0.4% and 0.1% of GDP respectively. This should be raised. Progeny of those who have got a position through quota should be denied the same privilege. One ‘quota-case’ in every family is sufficient. The misuse of the quota by the powerful and the rich should be taken care by proper investigations and checks must be undertaken. The essence of out effort is to ensure that every child has an equal opportunity, not to become equal but to become different – to realize whatever unique potential of body, mind and spirit he or she possess.
Health for all in a healthy environment
We should be able to provide services that cater to the health needs of all the people at the grass root level. For sixty years the health system in India has proven totally insufficient in delivering health care to the people of the country. Every citizen must be covered with better health facility and mechanism must be evolved to upgrade the existing health system. At the same time the country is facing serious environmental issues of pollution, waste disposal, deforestation, global warming and water scarcity. We aims to increase public awareness on science, technology, environment and development. And searching for solutions that people and communities can implement themselves.
Employment for the needy
The Gandhian model of employment, where a delicate balance of man and machine, must be followed as India is a populous country. India missed the industrial revolution, so the employment revolution. If a good governance is there then there will be growth of industries and more investment will be there thus creating more employment opportunities for the people living in that area. This will bring prosperity and prevent cities being overburdened by the problem of migrants with no employment. There seems to be a deliberate attempt to mislead public opinion by projecting caste-based reservation as the only form of affirmative action. Affirmative action has to “affirm” the social will to rectify unjust structures and practices in existence.
Transparent, corruption free governance
We have to develop good governance in our system as this will solve all the basic problems that we as citizens face and to inculcate civic sense in all our people as this is our country and we have to care for it. The present policy makers are shying from their responsibility to serve the country. As Ambedkar said there is nothing called a good Constitution or a bad Constitution! The quality of the Constitution depends on the working of the Constitution. Earlier, the Constitution worked because of the quality of leaders in Parliament. Subsequently power went into weaker hands. We have to establish transparency and accountability into the system. We have to end the criminalization of politics, rigging in elections, inordinate legal delays, bribes for everything, pitiful infrastructure, red tape, and arrogance of bureaucrats.
Establish true democracy
We believe in democracy. Democracy in true sense. We oppose a fake democracy that treats the intelligent and the foolish, the industrious and the lazy in the same way. We see in the present system of majorities and organized irresponsibility the main cause of our steadily increasing miseries. What we need is not mere change of players, but change in the rules of the game. When our representatives fail to bring about the required changes, the ball is in the people’s court. We and we alone can change things through collective assertion.
Strengthen nationhood
Let prejudices, unreasonable jealousies, and local interest yield to reason and liberality. Let us look to our national character, and to think beyond the present period. No morning ever dawned more favorable than ours did – and no day was ever more clouded than the present! Wisdom, and good examples are necessary at this time to rescue the political machine from the impending storm We strive to reduce inequalities in social, educational, economical and political field and thus aim at a strong nation where all citizen are united with a bond of fraternity..
Promote excellence: Build India a superpower
In these extraordinary times, where second best is just not good enough, educational institutions are the heart of the nation, vital to its well-being and progress. More than at another period in human history, the knowledge-base of a nation is critical to its prosperity. We must strive to undertake programs to enhance our scientific and technological capacities on a continuous basis. We must work in a manner where we can proudly say that “We no longer discuss the future of India. We say the future is India”. The effort of Youth For Equality is to take India to the pinnacle of developed countries from present developing phase and to restore the glory of its good old days.
Join us in building a just, equal and empowered India.