From Mon May 3 00:01:42 1999
Delivered-To: listsaver-of-agathiyar@egroups.com
Mailing-List: contact agathiyar-owner@egroups.com
X-Mailing-List: agathiyar@egroups.com
X-URL: http://www.egroups.com/list/agathiyar/
Reply-To: agathiyar@egroups.com
Delivered-To: listsaver-egroups-agathiyar@egroups.com
Received: (qmail 2452 invoked by uid 7770); 3 May 1999 07:01:39 -0000
Received: from dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com (206.214.98.4) by vault.egroups.com with SMTP; 3 May 1999 07:01:39 -0000
Received: (from smap@localhost) by dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com (8.8.4/8.8.4) id CAA07438; Mon, 3 May 1999 02:00:29 -0500 (CDT)
Received: from sji-ca1-103.ix.netcom.com(209.109.232.103) by dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com via smap (V1.3) id rma007433; Mon May 3 02:00:17 1999
Message-ID: <008101be9532$6ae8d5e0$67e86dd1@...>
From: "Mani M. Manivannan"
To:
Cc:
Date: Sun, 2 May 1999 23:58:57 -0700
MIME-Version: 1.0
X-Priority: 3
X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5
X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3
Subject: [agathiyar] NYTimes: On the Success of Quota Democracy
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 402

The New York Times dated May 3, 1999, runs a front page article
on the positive impact of the constitutional amendment that gives
power to women in a third of the village councils and also sets aside
a portion of that to low caste women. The article reflects the attitude
of higher castes towards this and their attempts to manipulate to
their advantage.



It appears that, atleast in India, the quota system works. It certainly
has had an enormous impact in education, bureaucracy and political
representation. On the other hand, the system has a way of sustaining
itself further cementing the divisions rather than building a community
of equals. With the failure of so many reformist movements, it may
be inevitable that there may never be a community of equals and quota
system is the only way to tackle a fundamentally unjust hierarchical
system. After all this is a country that could not accept Jagajivan Ram
as Prime Minister because of his caste but is drooling at the prospect
of elevating a young woman to Prime Ministership - never mind she
hasn't run a thing in her life - just because she was born in the neo-Royal
Gandhi family.

Mani M. Manivannan
Fremont, CA, USA


------------------------------------------------------------------------
eGroup home: http://www.eGroups.com/group/agathiyar
http://www.eGroups.com - Simplifying group communications