What we need for meaningful policies is a socio-economic survey to determine backwardness and change among communities, not just a simple headcount based on caste or community.
Published May 05, 2025 | 9:00 AM ⚊ Updated May 05, 2025 | 8:57 PM
What we need for meaningful policies is a socio-economic survey to determine backwardness and change among communities. (iStock)
Synopsis: Just as Southern states that have controlled population growth do not want to be punished by a reduction in the share of their states in the overall number of constituencies in the Lok Sabha, some communities may not like the idea of any sub-division or reclassification of OBCs.
There’s an old American joke on marital status that helps me understand the caste issue in India. The answer to the question, “Are you single?” could be: “Depends on who is asking.”
India’s caste conundrum is somewhat similar. The answer to the question, “Do you belong to a backward caste?” could be: “Depends on whether it is for a job or marriage.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP-led NDA government has indeed bitten a political bullet by accepting a widespread demand among allies and the opposition alike to conduct a caste census as part of the long-held-up population census, but it is clear as day to me that a lot more needs to be done on the issue – in the design of the census itself, how it is interpreted in political terms and the way public policies on issues such as reservations in jobs are framed eventually.
The promised census opens a whole new chapter in Indian politics, not seen since 1990, when the then-Prime Minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh implemented the Mandal Commission report. I was close to the action, covering the anti-reservation movement against the report that set the stage for the reservation of jobs for other backward classes (OBCs) in the Union government. Events since then have opened my eyes to various perspectives and views on the issue to reveal shades of grey that cannot be wished away. The whole business is a mix of political expediency and genuine social transformation, with narratives getting mixed up like crossed wires.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi deservedly takes the credit for forcing Modi’s hand on the issue by repeatedly demanding a caste census, but we must remember that in 1990, the Congress party under his father Rajiv Gandhi was in the same corner as the BJP is in today. It was an open secret in Delhi that the Congress supported and indirectly fuelled the anti-Mandal agitation because VP Singh played a smart move on the electoral chessboard across Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and indeed, elsewhere in the country by embracing the Mandal report, although he was reluctant to implement it initially.
Reservations for OBCs, unlike Dalits and Adivasis, who are classified as Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, involve tricky puzzles. Backwardness to define OBCs is a somewhat relative term and involves claims that are not easily verifiable or agreed upon. Dalits have historically been landless labourers subject to various forms of negative discrimination, exploitation, and oppression, including untouchability, while tribals have mostly inhabited forested or mountainous areas, living lifestyles largely untouched by either agriculture or modernity.
In contrast, OBCs have been part of Indian society as artisans, carpenters, builders, farmers, and agriculturists, among other professions. Deciding who is backward is a complex issue, as OBCs are also an aggressive, hardworking lot who have gained from various economic and social policies since Independence.
The Mandal Commission used 11 criteria involving social, educational, and economic factors to decide backwardness and identify OBCs. These factors included ownership of assets, school dropout rates, degree of manual labour in their daily lives, etc. However, it is possible to find wealthy OBCs or members of these communities who are otherwise perceived as or claimed to be “backward” in terms of social status or educational classifications. That is what leads to the tricky business of some backward castes wanting to be viewed like the upper-crust Kshatriya warriors or wanting to be seen as elites in terms of marriage goals that lead to upward social mobility. The so-called OBCs, in some cases, are seen as oppressors of Dalits even today. That is hardly what you would expect of people trying to gain from state policies.
There is also the question of castes referring to themselves as “communities” to imply equal status in social terms, but cleverly using politics to play social victims. Inter-caste marriages are rare in India because even the so-called backward communities project themselves as forward when it comes to personal matters and material ambitions.
Now, consider the fact that after India began implementing economic reforms in 1991, roughly the time when the first of the Mandal Report beneficiaries entered the government, a lot has changed in the country. More than 30 years of reasonably high economic growth have taken place, alongside urbanisation and the introduction of new technologies and educational opportunities that have benefited OBCs. If one were to look at the criteria used by the Mandal Commission, some of the OBCs of 1990 may no longer deserve to be classified in the category, certainly not in the same degree, and most certainly not all members of the communities in question.
What we need, therefore, for meaningful policies is a socio-economic survey to determine backwardness and change among communities, not just a simple headcount based on caste or community. There is a long road to traverse in this direction, because there are and will be significant political controversies and opposition to any fresh classifications. You could say a caste reclassification is to social dynamics what constituency delimitation is to electoral politics. Just as
Southern states that have controlled population growth do not want to be punished by a reduction in the share of their states in the overall number of constituencies in the Lok Sabha, some communities may not like the idea of any sub-division or reclassification of OBCs.
Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah has asked for a socio-economic survey alongside a caste census precisely even as the dominant backward communities of Lingayats and Vokkaligas have been loudly opposing the implementation of the Social and Educational Survey done by the Karnataka Backward Classes Commission in 2015 – which you could call a mini 2.0 version of the Mandal report that undoes some of the old classifications.
The Lingayats and Vokkaligas describe the survey as “unscientific” even as less known backward communities are increasingly vocal in demanding their share of benefits. The point to note is that the 2015 survey took the Vokkaliga and Lingayat communities out of the OBC status accorded by the Mandal Commission setting the stage for a relook at backward class classification.
It is clear that measuring backwardness for job reservation and other benefits, much like measuring the poverty line among economists, is a matter of controversial line drawing. Naturally, electoral politics, courtroom battles, and street protests will play a role in both the selection of the criteria used to measure backwardness and the subsequent implementation of any classification for benefits.
What the BJP has done in effect is just a baby step, keeping in mind the upcoming elections in caste-driven Bihar and possibly, the Tamil Nadu assembly polls due in 2026. Both states are known for active reservation politics. An increase in the overall quota for OBCs and others as a whole is also a key issue.
Last month, Rahul Gandhi asserted that his party wants to dismantle the 50 percent ceiling on reservations for SCs, STs, and OBCs in education and government jobs, citing Telangana as a precedent. The Congress government in the state passed new bills that will take the total quantum of caste-based reservations in the state to 63%, far beyond the Supreme Court-mandated 50 percent.
There is also the issue of the “Creamy Layer” of OBCs. In 1992, the Supreme Court ruled that the “Creamy Layer” of OBCs should be excluded from the list of beneficiaries of reservations, there should not be reservations in promotions, and the total reserved quota should not exceed 50 percent.
Dynamic social and economic changes in India would mean a fresh look at various issues concerning the creamy layer as well, to make sure that affirmative action does not benefit an elite within OBCs operating with a sense of entitlement. Rahul Gandhi’s slogan, “Jitni Abadi, Utna Haq” (As the share of the population, thus the share of rights) smells less of affirmative action to reduce social inequities and more like a call for proportional representation based on headcount.
Political ambitions pitted against affirmative action calls for a fresh judicial review, which is bound to happen. What all this means is that a Pandora’s box of possibilities is waiting to be opened. Knowing Modi and the BJP, I know they will try as much as possible to drag their feet on the real issues following their promise of a caste census. This is a new political soap opera at work with many episodes to unfold.
(The writer is a senior journalist and commentator who has worked for Reuters, The Economic Times, Business Standard, and Hindustan Times. He posts on X as @madversity. Views are personal. Edited by Majnu Babu).
