Infosys chairman and chief mentor N R Narayana Murthy today dismissed the need for reservation for Backward Communities in institutions like IITs and IIMs. Speaking to presspersons at the Infosys campus in Bangalore, Murthy said, ‘‘There is no doubt that there has been social injustice in this country for several years now. I am not opposed to reservation for Scheduled Castes/ Scheduled Tribes, but expanding the scope of reservations to central educational institutions is not the right solution.’’ He added that if central educational institutions were expected to reserve seats for people from backward communities, the government ought to consider reservation in the armed forces as well. ‘‘The basic problem in the country is that there aren’t enough children enrolled into schools at the primary and secondary level. The government should focus on bringing more children into the schools and make sure that schemes like the mid-day meal programmes are working well,’’ he said. Murthy said, ‘‘Reservation is not the solution. We have to invest in children at an early stage, spend more money on them and make them market-worthy. This must become our national mission.’’
