Syeda Mazhar
While Modi touts his country as “Shining India” depicting a very progressive, peaceful and culturally enriched setting the truth cannot be much uglier bellying all his statements. Even in these contemporary modern times the country is still embroiled in their treacherous caste system. Presently the country is in grip of severe agitation and reservations of the Jats of Haryana which is threatening to spill over the rest of the country if the said community is not appeased.
Jats are an agricultural caste group in Haryana, and seven other states in North India, notably Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat. In Haryana, they are the predominant caste and therefore politically influential. Presently the Jats are demanding reservation in government jobs and educational institutions under the OBC category. (Other backward class). This is not new the Jat quota agitation has crippled Haryana for the second time in less than a year. The latest protests, however has been more violent. The protest has severely hit water supplies to Delhi which is a metropolis of more than 20 million, forcing factories to close and also killing 20 people. Indian government has now deployed thousands of troops with shoot on sight orders in the northern state on Sunday to quell protest as the Jat community went berserk. Rioting and looting in Haryana by the Jats, a rural caste, is symptomatic of increasingly fierce competition for government jobs and educational openings. India reserves places for lower castes to try to bring victims of the country’s worst discrimination into the main stream. But the policy causes resentment among other communities who says it freezes them out.
While innocent lives are taken and people killed with the riots threatening to escalate Narendra Modi typically ignores the protests and instead gave a speech on rural and urban development in the eastern state of Chhattisgarh, unveiling a statue to a late Indian guru and praising a 104 year old woman for backing his campaign for Clean India.
The protestors have attacked the homes of Regional Ministers, torched railway stations and staged sit-ins on tracks, blocking hundreds of trains. They had sabotaged pumping equipment at a water treatment plant that provides most of the Delhi’s water. The Delhi government ordered schools to shut and rationed water supply to residents to ensure that hospitals and emergency services have enough. India’s biggest carmaker by sales, suspended operations at its plants in the state after the protests disrupted the supply of some components.
In the meantime, Pakistan Railways on the request of the Indian authorities cancelled the Samjhota Express. The Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation (PTDC) suspended the Lahore Delhi Dosti Bus Service for a day due to the ongoing riots in the Indian state of Haryana.
It is surprising that “Modern India” is still entrapped in India’s caste system. The tragic truth about India’s caste system is that the Indian cling to it themselves and have been unable to shun it despite all the education and progressive attitude. Since India’s lower castes had been systematically disadvantaged for so long, the state created a quota of government jobs and university seats created that would be reserved for the former lower castes. However there is a small packet of groups who resent the system. To get into a top university, a student with a backward caste certificate needs a lower grade than the others. The rule sometimes spurs frustration in India’s intensely competitive schools. The same rule applies for plum government jobs. Thus, the Jats protests, and their demand for the quotas to increase in the OBS (other backward class). The general public of India would obviously be feeling that undue advantage is being meted out to them as principally the Jats are financially stable and politically affluent.
Disruption has been huge, with atleast 850 trains cancelled, 500 factories closed and business losses estimated at as much as $ 5 billion by one regional lobby group. The army retook control of a canal that supplies three fifths of the capital’s water on Monday. An important sluice gate was reopened, but protestors sought to cut off the water supply at another location. As the canal has also been damaged by the protestors, repair work will have to be done and the water crisis will continue for a few more days.
While the protests and violence continue Modi remains silent throughout the worst social unrest of his 20 months in office. This clearly indicates that Shining India just remains a dream in the hearts and minds of the Indians and in reality the phrase remains a metaphor meant to be used to impress the International community and to digress it from the shameful truth.
