Of all of the reservations proposed and implemented by the honorable HRD minister Arjun Singh, the one I fail to understand at any level is that of faculty in IIT's. I feel kinda sorry for the existing faculty and students at IIT's who I guess are rather pissed with this. Reserving seats for students is one thing but reserving faculty positions is dangerous. By admitting inferior students you really don't compromise any academic opportunities available to students. Yes, things like academic atmosphere and placements do suffer but these are in the "can be handled/absorbed" category. I feel anybody in their right mind cannot sign off on something like this.
By installing inferior faculty you are screwing everybody for very obvious reasons. And I really don't see any benefits of this to anybody. To be a faculty at an IIT you need at least a PhD. Now I think I can safely assume that somebody with a PhD in any engineering or science discipline really doesn't need help in getting a job. The beneficiaries of reservation should be people who are needy or disadvantaged. If you are telling me that somebody with a PhD falls into this category then I think we have much more serious issues with society and our education system, then can be fixed with reservations.
But what is most worrying, is the Ministry for HRD. This decision doesn't help improve any academic standards, does not help any disadvantaged section of society or give the government any political mileage(I would bet less then 0.1% of India understands anything about faculty positions at IIT's or even remotely cares). It worries me that there is no thought behind decision making in India's premier education controlling authority. If there is I would welcome the ministry to share it. Right now Arjun Singh reminds me of a certain Muhammad bin Tuhglaq I had studied about in class 7. This Tughlaq dude did a lot of crazy and whimsical stuff much like Arjun Singh is doing today.
A lot of institutions have had run ins with the government. The Indian Armed forces summarily rejected reservations proposed. Even the IIM boards have resisted reservations and have even tried to get court injunctions if I am not mistaken. Here is where I feel the governing body of the IIT's has let everybody down. They have been silent bystanders to the systematic destruction of the IIT's. They have not spoken up and this is where they are doing more damage to the IIT system then Arjun Singh himself. I hope somebody on the governing body of the IIT's reads this and finds the strength to take on the HRD minister.
2 comments:
I concur with your views. The only thing I wanna add is the role that the reservation policy has in creating influential individuals from the disadvantaged communities. I see that one doesn't have to undermine the quality of the IIT professors for this, and I do not condone this move. However, generally speaking, reservations need to be viewed a little more broadly than just creating job/education opportunities for the backward classes. That's not all of the story.
One late B R Ambedkar still provides tens of lakhs of Dalits the strength to stand up for their rights. If more such personnel of power and influence come along, their long-awaited entry into the mainstream could really pick up momentum. There is also the role model aspect. A lower class std 12 kid will find great motivation in seeing a chap from his community at a respectable position in the academia. [Of course, that's not reason enough to get undeserved people into those positions]
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