Minority ruling the Majority(??????)

Ever since I read a couple of articles in rediff about the brahmins and their plight, so many thoughts have been crossing my mind. The issue is a very important one and also a very neglected one. The articles may have affected me more since I am also a brahmin. I have tried best to bring this issue from a neutral standpoint.

India is a unique country in many ways. It is also very unique in the sense that it is probably the only nation in the world where the minority rules the majority. All attention is turned towards the minority and the majority fears the minority because the card of secularism is overplayed by the politicians, media and by almost everybody in the country. Many of us(including me) have not voiced their true opinions for being stereotyped and for fear of being criticized for supporting the majority(even though that maybe the logical and the right opinion). The rediff article brought out the plight of the Brahmins with so many statistics that brought out the gross disparity in pay for the Brahmins. There are very few Government support programs for the downtrodden brahmins. There are so many issues apart from the prime issue affecting the so called "Forward Community" - RESERVATION. I think reservation has lost us many deserving Doctors and now with the reservations in the IIM we will probably lose out on many more deserving Business Acumen. This is the prime reason for very few brahmins being Doctors. The probability and possibility of a Brahmin getting into Medical College(especially in my part of the Country- Tamil Nadu ) is very very low. Brahmin Parents (who generally are very proud of the academic achievements of their kids and do anything to motivate them during high school) considering the enormity of the task involved, discourage their child to become Doctors and ask them to seek some alternate routes. Reservation leads to a situation to what me and my friend calls " Reverse Discrimination". Deserving people are left out for no fault of theirs and may feel demotivated. People who really want to get into the best school and put in the required hardwork are very frustrated and disappointed when they could not make the cut just because of the reservation. This may have devastating effects when they are just out of high school. Let me tell you how the reservation should work. No way should a person who have the required marks should be out.Statistics have shown that the reserved seats almost end up getting not fully filled and the percentage of people who complete the degree is also relatively low. The seats must be increased totally to accomodate the people who come in the reservation quota. This is just one more instance of everything being done in India to please the minority. The sad but true thing is that there are many people who convert just to take the benefits of being a minority. Reservations and minority were issues that were played by politicians to garner votes and is a very bad influence on the society.

Everyone in India will remembra the Gujarat riots as one where several muslims were killed. No one remembers why and how the Gujarat riots were started. It was started when the coach containing many hindu brahmins had been burnt alive by some miscreants. Here I am not justifying that Godhra riots were the right retaliation and saying what Narendra Modi did what was right. The sad thing about the buring up was that it was not big news and very little interest was shown by the media. Jayalalitha was one of the very few who spoke about the incident and I think her comments about this was one of the best things done by her. Her comments were something similar to the following lines. "Just because the people who died were from the forward caste the issue is not being talked about. The media does not spread the news, No politician has condemned the killings for fear of being typecasted. I am not like that" The message sent by Jayalalitha's statements were very clear. Maybe the life of a person from the minority is more valuable than a person from the Forward Caste. We see many news about muslims being killed but when the same thing happens to the opposite end of the caste ladder it is being downplayed. Incidents like these and many more make me think that we need the RSSs and the BJPs and Bal Thackerays just to keep the Brahmins in the society. I still do not know whose life is more valuable. Maybe at least in India, the life of a minority is more valuable. I really hope that the above statement is not true but sadly it is true.

Here are the links to the two articles I read. Please take a few minutes and read the article.

http://ia.rediff.com/news/2006/jun/15franc.htm?q=tp&file=.htm
http://in.rediff.com/news/2006/may/23franc.htm