mandal commission report 1990 - All you need to know

Reservation system in India and  Mandal commission  : All you need to know for your competitive exams

Aren't we all the same, if yes then why reservations

The Mandal Commission was established in India in 1979 by the Janata Party government under Prime Minister Morarji Desai with a mandate to "identify the socially or educationally backward."

The plan to set up another commission was taken in 1978 as per the mandate of the Constitution of India under article 340 for the purpose of Articles like 15 and 16 with an aim to consider the question of seat reservations and quotas for people to redress caste discrimination, and used eleven social, economic, and educational indicators to determine backwardness.

In 1980, the commission's report affirmed the affirmative action practice under Indian law whereby members of lower castes (known as Other Backward Classes (OBC), Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST)) were given exclusive reservations to a certain portion of government jobs and slots in public universities, and recommended changes to these quotas, increasing them by 27% to 49.5%.

Criteria to identify OBC

The Mandal Commission adopted various methods and techniques to collect the necessary data and evidence, these can be broadly classified into 11 criteria under three major headings as:-

Social

1. Castes/classes considered as socially backward by others.
2. Castes/classes which mainly depend on manual labo for their livelihood.
3. Castes/classes where at least 25 per cent females and 10 per cent males above the state average get married at an age below 17 years in rural areas and at least 10 per cent females and 5 per cent mates do so in urban areas.
4. Castes/classes where participation of females in work is at least 2 per cent above the state average

Educational

1. Castes/classes where the number of children in the age group of 5–15 years who never attended school is at least 25 per cent above the state average.
2. Castes/classes when the rate of student drop-out in the age group of 5 15 years is at least 25 per cent above the state average.
3. Castes/classes amongst whom the proportion of matriculates is at least 25 per cent below the state average,

Economic

1. Castes/classes where the average value of family assets is at least 25 per cent below the state average
2. Castes/classes where the number of families living in kuccha houses is at least 25 per cent above the state average.
3. Castes/classes where the source of drinking water is beyond half a kilometre for more than 50 per cent of the households.
4. Castes/classes where the number of households having taken consumption loans is at least 25 per cent above the' state average.

Weighting indicators

• Social indicators were given a weightage of 3 points each, 
• Educational indicators were given a weightage of 2 points each
• Economic indicators were given a weightage of 1 point each.

Thus, the Mandal Commission judged classes on a scale from 0 to 22. These 11 indicators were applied to all the castes covered by the survey for a particular state.
As a result of this application, all castes which had a score of 50% (i.e. 11 points) were listed as socially and educationally backward and the rest were treated as 'advanced'.

Observations and findings

1. The commission estimated that 54% of the total population (excluding SCs and STs), belonging to 3,743 different castes and communities, were ‘backward’.
2. The population of Hindu OBCs was derived by subtracting from the total population of Hindus, the population of SC and ST and that of forward Hindu castes and communities, and it worked out to be 52 per cent.
3. Assuming that roughly the proportion of OBCs amongst non-Hindus was of the same order as amongst the Hindus, the population of non-Hindu OBCs was considered as 52 per cent.

Assumptions :

1. Assuming that a child from an advanced class family and that of a backward class family had the same intelligence at the time of their birth, it is obvious that owing to vast differences in social, cultural and environmental factors,
2. the former will beat the latter by lengths in any competitive field.
3. Even if an advanced class child's intelligence quotient was much lower compared to the child of backward class, chances are that the former will still beat the latter in any competition where selection is made on the basis of 'merit'.

Wheteher Mandal commision has achieved its objective or not , I leave this question unanswered but I am sure for one thing and that is a number of bright students in India are denied seats in good colleges because of this reservation system in India and a good number of candidates are denied jobs because a few less deserving candidates carry reservation with them.