Beyond reservation

A competitive race is underway to ban Prakash Jha's film Aarakshan. First UP and then Punjab have proscribed the movie, which some have accused of sending out an 'anti-quota' message despite the filmmaker's denials. The controversy, coming just before India's 65th Independence Day, raises a fundamental question: Why is reservation still such a contentious issue? Have we failed to break out of the mindset favouring a divisive caste-based quota system? Rather than forging unity, quotas today are a tool of vote-bank politics and a potential trigger of social conflict.

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