Letters To The Editor

It is reported that the Ministry of HRD is planning to have a quota of close to 50 per cent for SC/ST students in the IIMs.

Undeserving target

8226; It is reported that the Ministry of HRD is planning to have a quota of close to 50 per cent for SC/ST students in the IIMs. This would be a wrong-headed move, since any support to the backward community should only be up to the graduate level and not beyond. The logic for this is that the output of our management graduates should be world-class, particularly in the context of India emerging as a global economy. The same applies to the IITs and all professional courses, where again we should concentrate on creating a world-class technical talent pool and should not be pulled down by considerations of assistance to the backward communities. If close to 60 years after Independence we are still falling back on the device of reservation, then what we have been doing all these decades is either not correct or the targeted communities are less than deserving.

8212; S. Kamat Alto Porvorim

Resignation ruse

8226; Holding an office of profit is common and openly endorsed by political parties across the spectrum. Ruling parties or coalitions are known to reward disgruntled supporters with coveted government offices of profit, particularly those who could not be accommodated as ministers in view of the recently introduced limit to the size of ministries. Sonia Gandhi is no exception. She very well knew that her holding the office of chairperson as an MP was in violation of the law and against the spirit of the Constitution. Amending the Constitution now to protect certain strategic offices of profit would still violate the spirit of the Constitution as envisaged by the founding fathers of our republic. In the brouhaha over office of profit issue a significant fact has got drowned. Namely, where was the need for Sonia to resign as an MP? What was her motive? Was it to sincerely abide by the law and the Constitution? If that was her motive then demitting the office of NAC chairperson would have sufficed.

8212; Sameer Kumar Mumbai

Take on profit

8226; Indians should be more intelligent than making a hue and cry over the issue of office of profit. How can public institutions put under the charge of public figures be categorised as being profit-making and come under the EC8217;s axe? Something is wrong somewhere. The phrase 8216;office of profit8217; is an oxymoron. After Sonia Gandhi made her epoch making speech about 8220;doing the right thing,8221; the Indian press by and large panned her. The international press, though, had a different take. Here is quoting the Herald Tribune on Sonia Gandhi: 8220;Her hair pulled back in unusually severe fashion, her expression sober and unsmiling, she told reporters she had been 8216;hurt8217; by the suggestion of wrong doing and stressed that she had not gone into politics for personal gain.8221;

8212; Mukund B. Kunte New Delhi

Killer technology

8226; The killing of the female foeteus just shows how insensitive and immoral we are. If society is trying to race ahead at the cost of this practice of mass murder then certainly it is a recipe for disaster in near future. I think, after the atom bomb it is the second largest misuse of technology.

8212; Dheeraj Pandey Ghaziabad