Reservation Or No Reservation

In 1997, my Engineering and Medical entrance results were announced and I got 825th rank for engineering in the state. With this rank, getting Electronics and Communications Engg. (ECE) or Computer Science (CS) at Govt. College of Engineering, Trivandrum (CET), the Engg. college that was rated best in the state at that time, was very difficult. But I know people who were ranked in 1000s and 2000s and got admission at CET for ECE/CS. Thanks to reservations for Socially & Economically Backward Castes (SEBC) and Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (SC/SCT).

One of my friends who got 2000+ rank, but belonged to "economically" and "socially" forward caste, was literally in tears cursing himself for not having prepared well enough to score better and end up in a good college. He had to work hard to earn his rank and probably much more than few others who scored lower and ended up in better colleges.

Now that I have delivered my case, the question that I have is why do we need reservations/quota system in India?

Reservations/quotas are in effect giving oppurtunities to unqualified candidates as opposed to qualified candidates. Moreover, most of these candidates who enter the system through reservation, in most cases, eventually end up not being able to benefit from the opportunity as much a qualified candidate would have. If they were qualified enough, they wouldn't need reservation in the first place.

In no way I am trying to say that people who get in through reservations are inferior or less capable. But, because of the quota system, most of these people are not ready to compete.

Creating quota system for SEBC/SC/ST for admissions to IIMs or even worse in private sector, is going to increasingly hamper the system.

Admission to educational institutions and Govt. jobs should be purely based on merit so that the end product is of good quality. There are people who belong economically backward class and inevitably need financial support for completing education. For this, financial subsidies in tuition fees and miscellaneous other charges can be implemented (in fact these subsidies are already in place).

Here is the distribution of castes/class (source):

Backward Caste - 36%
SC/ST - 28%
Forward Caste - 36%

Almost 64% of the population is eligible for quota system where as poor people from "forward caste" hardly get any social or economical benefit over people from economically forward backward caste.

By implementing quota system, we may just be slowing down the productivity and efficiency. Having the system purely on merit with financial subsidies for economically backward (any caste) is the way to go.

Any reservations?