With reservations

With politicians having made up their minds to override a Supreme Court judgment via a constitutional amendment, the business of higher educ...

With politicians having made up their minds to override a Supreme Court judgment via a constitutional amendment, the business of higher education has been spared at least one conflict8212;that between the legislature and judiciary. But other battles loom, in spite and because of the assertion of parliamentary prerogative. The first of these is between the emotive politics of reservations and hard facts. It is not only cynical, vote-your-caste politicians who will welcome the extension of positive discrimination into this new domain. Many sensible observers will argue that with the private sector taking on an increasingly important role in education supply, the lack of quotas left no way in for many of the truly disadvantaged. Persuasive as that sounds, it fails to clear the truth test. The truth is that decades of reservations in state and state-aided education have not significantly increased the representation of Dalits and SC/STs. The story here mirrors that in government8212;jobs quotas are generally filled up in the lowest categories but the higher you go, the fewer are the examples of successful social engineering. There8217;s little reason to presume education quotas will work in the new area either.

The second conflict is between government priorities and private prerogatives. Almost all forms of official social engineering involve interference in private rights. But some interfere more than others, which is the case with quotas in unaided private institutions. The fundamental principle8212;that an enterprise set up with private resources should be able to conduct its business freely8212;is at stake here. To argue that education cannot only be a business is to miss the point. If suppliers of private education apprehend that the nature of their enterprise makes them more vulnerable to direct official action, the supply may be affected in future. That brings up the third and most important clash: between supply and demand of quality education. India has a state education sector that is resource-poor at the primary/secondary stage. At the higher end, there is a surfeit of universities and colleges that excel in providing almost worthless education. The rise of private education institutions, including overly buccaneering ones, is partly a result of this.

If the government spends wisely on education, if it insists on quality and has the ability to deliver it, the disadvantaged can be educated, even without quotas. But, of course, that8217;s so much tougher than passing laws.