Caste census | Mandal vs Hindutva

It’s truly game on for Election 2024. Just as Prime Minister Narendra Modi was basking in the afterglow of having pulled off a successful G20 summit, the Canada chapter only a minor blip in the narrative, and bowled a googly with the Women’s Reservation Bill in a special session of Parliament, which sent his personal popularity ratings soaring, Bihar chief minister and Janata Dal (United) patriarch Nitish Kumar has hit a sixer that has the BJP stumped for the moment. On October 2, the birth anniversary of the man who championed the cause of the Harijan, Nitish chose to make public the results of the Bihar Jaati Adharit Ganana, or the Bihar caste-based census. Though couched as a victory for social justice, there was no disguising the political nature of the move.The Bihar caste survey confirms what everyone has suspected for a while now. That OBCs, or the Other Backward Classes, number more than the 52 per cent enumerated in the 1931 census (which formed the basis of the Mandal Commission report in 1980), strengthening the argument that their share in reservations is far less than they should be entitled to. OBCs and EBCs (Extremely Backward Classes) constitute 63.1 per cent of the state’s population, the Bihar census has revealed. SCs and STs together account for 21.3 per cent while the forward castes make up the remaining 15.5 per cent. Across the country, SCs and STs together have 22.5 per cent reservation in government jobs and educational institutes; the OBCs 27 per cent. The Bihar caste census is certain to strengthen the demand for an increase in the quota for backward classes as well as a rejig of the existing reservation structure across the country. With this bombshell, not only does Nitish hope to burnish his credentials as a messiah of the OBCs but also to assert that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are interested only in co-opting them in the larger Hindutva agenda, doing little for their socio-economic uplift. To the newly-minted Opposition alliance, which has come together under the banner of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance, or INDIA, the Bihar survey has handed a solid electoral plank to enter the Lok Sabha polls within another seven months. Opposition parties are, in fact, calling it Mandal 2.0, as a follow-up to Version 1.0 when the V.P. Singh government implemented the Mandal Commission’s recommendations in 1990, sending national politics into a chaotic tailspin. The release of the Bihar census is likely to set off a chain reaction in other states. At stake will be more than nine million government jobs at the central and state levels, and admissions in educational institutes, including 2.3 million seats in engineering colleges and 100,000-plus in medical institutions. It threatens to open a Pandora’s box that could see every caste in the country scrambling for a piece of the reservations pie.WHAT MANDAL 2.0 SIGNIFIESIf Mandal 1.0 saw the decimation of the Congress and the rise of regional parties such as the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in Uttar Pradesh and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in Bihar, the Opposition hopes that Mandal 2.0 will do the same to the BJP now. That, however, is easier said than done. The saffron party has, over the years, chipped at the base of the regional caste-based formations by wooing the OBCs, celebrating their icons, history and culture, and making them aware of the several government welfare schemes that they benefit from. Little wonder the OBC vote has been crucial in the two successive victories of the BJP in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha election. A 2019 study by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in Delhi estimated that the OBC vote for the BJP doubled from 22 per cent in 2009 to 44 per cent in 2019. It is this support that the Opposition aims to strike at by invoking Mandal 2.0. And the Bihar survey, it hopes, will be the foundation stone for this second phase of Mandal politics, helping it counter the BJP’s politics of Kamandal (the sacred Hindu water pot as a metaphor), as part of which it seeks to subsume caste identity under a broader Hindutva narrative and highlight universal welfarism to pre-empt the fragmentation of the OBC vote along caste lines.For the BJP, a caste census can have serious implications in a dozen-plus states that have massive OBC populations—UP, Bihar, Jharkhand, Rajasthan, Haryana, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Together, they account for 374 of the 543 seats in the Lok Sabha. Four of them—Rajasthan, MP, Chhattisgarh and Telangana—will go to the polls later in the year, and will be the first test of the Mandal vs Kamandal battle.The BJP itself has been fighting shy of stirring the hornets’ nest. Though Rajnath Singh as the Union home minister in 2018 had promised that data on OBCs would be collected in the 2021 census, the Covid-19 pandemic put paid to the exercise itself and the Union ministry of social justice and empowerment, in an affidavit filed before the Supreme Court in 2021, said that a caste census was logistically unfeasible. The same year, Nityanand Rai, the minister of state for home affairs, told the Lok Sabha that the Union government had, as a matter of policy, decided not to enumerate caste-wise populations other than SCs and STs in the census. THE OPPOSITION GAME PLANIf calling their alliance INDIA was one master stroke, Mandal 2.0 will be equally heavy artillery in the hands of the Opposition, going into the Lok Sabha polls next year. By rooting for a caste-based census, the Opposition parties hope to consolidate the OBC vote by fostering a new consciousness regarding their numerical strength and using it to claim a higher share in the job and education quota. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had indicated as much at an election rally in Kolar city in Karnataka on April 16, when he recast the Kanshi Ram slogan “Jiski jitni sankhya bhaari, utni uski bhaagidari” to declare “Jitni aabaadi, utna haq (Rights proportionate to the share of population)”. And now, when Nitish made the results of his state survey public, the Congress leader reiterated: “The greater the population, the greater the rights. This is our pledge.” Traditionally, though, the Congress had not been in favour of caste enumeration. Jawaharlal Nehru opposed the idea in 1951. Indira Gandhi put the report of the Mandal Commission—ordered by the Janata Party government that came to power in 1977—on the back burner even though it was submitted in 1980. Even Rajiv Gandhi ignored it. When V.P. Singh implemented OBC reservation, Rajiv termed it as an attempt to divide the country along caste lines. But the party had begun waking up to the OBC potential during the United Progressive Alliance regime. In 2006, the Manmohan Singh government announced 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in admission to central educational institutions. In 2011, the government conducted a nationwide Socio Economic and Caste Census (SECC) to identify the beneficiaries of the various government schemes. Its findings were not published, though. With the clamour for a caste census growing now, the Congress has thrown its weight behind it, as it feels the issue could be the glue that may bind regional satraps to it and eventually defeat the BJP.With the BJP reluctant about a caste-based census for fear of disturbing the status quo and upsetting the savarna castes on the eve of several state elections and the general election, the Opposition has been steadily raising the pitch on a nationwide caste census. Most Opposition parties, including the Congress, SP, BSP, RJD, JD(U), Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Bharat Rashtra Samithi, Telugu Desam Party, the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena and the Sharad Pawar faction of the Nationalist Congress Party, have been demanding a commitment from the Union government to include caste enumeration whenever the exercise is held next. Some of the non-aligned parties such as the Yuvajana Sramik Rythu Congress Party in Andhra Pradesh and the Biju Janata Dal in Odisha as well as a few of the BJP’s allies such as the Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP, the Nishad Party and the Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) have joined the chorus. Meanwhile, several non-BJP-ruled states have, in the past year, either conducted caste surveys or expressed their intent to do so. While Odisha has initiated a caste survey, Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah has decided to accept the results of the ‘Socio-Economic and Education Survey’ that was conducted in 2015 during his previous stint in power and is likely to release the results next month. In UP, the SP had, in its election manifesto for the 2022 assembly polls, promised to conduct a caste census if voted to power.Only one Opposition party, the Trinamool Congress, is reportedly unhappy with the idea. West Bengal chief minister and TMC chief Mamata Banerjee’s discomfort stems from the alleged advantage that Muslim OBC groups enjoy in the reservation benefits. The West Bengal BJP alleges that the community has cornered 91.5 per cent of the reservation in the state, and Hindu OBC communities have been discriminated against. A caste census may expose her bias, claim Mamata’s detractors.THE BJP COUNTERA day after Nitish announced the results of the Bihar caste survey, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, speaking at a rally in Jagdalpur in Chhattisgarh, described the Opposition efforts as an attempt to create a divide among Hindus. Jettisoning caste altogether, Modi instead sought to recast the BJP’s concern for the people in economic terms. In response to Rahul’s ‘Jitni aabaadi, utna haq’ slogan, he said, “Their leader said rights should be proportional to population. I say the biggest population is the poor. For me, the poor people have the biggest population, and my mission is their welfare.” An anti-OBC quota rally in Delhi in 1990; (Photo: Sharad Saxena) Indeed, by creating a massive infrastructure for timely and direct delivery of government welfare schemes and weeding out the need for political and bureaucratic patronage, the Modi government seems to have ensured that caste considerations have ceased to influence voter choices, going by the electoral results. “The effective delivery of services, the evolution of the labharthi (beneficiary) constituency has helped BJP dilute caste identity politics,” says Badri Narayan, director of the Govind Ballabh Pant Social Science Institute in Allahabad. The BJP’s OBC Morcha chief K. Laxman says the party will run massive awareness campaigns across the nation to tell OBC voters what Modi has done for them. “The Nitish Kumar government,” he adds, “has released the caste census data with a political motive. They make noise but do little for backward classes. The Modi government has delivered multiple benefits in the past 10 years. That’s the reason people from the backward classes are firmly with the BJP.”Psephologist Pradeep Gupta, too, thinks that Modi’s record of service delivery will blunt the Opposition’s caste-based political narrative. “History says that any party, starting from V.P. Singh’s Janata Dal, which has initiated big-ticket reservation for any community has lost the next election,” he says. The BJP has also been careful to maintain a significant representation of OBC leaders within the party apparatus and government. The party accounts for 68 per cent of the total OBC MPs in the Lok Sabha while 38 per cent of its total MPs are from OBC communities. The 77-member Modi ministry has 27 OBC ministers. The Lohar community protesting in Patna to seek reservation, Apr. 2023; (Photo: Getty Images) And while it was initially perceived as a party of Brahmins and Baniyas, two elite caste groups, the BJP has over the years, expanded its political base by taking advantage of the growing perception among the numerically weaker OBC groups that parties like the SP or the RJD were led by, and served only, the dominant Yadavs, and that, among the smaller Dalit communities, only the Jatavs have benefitted from the BSP. The BJP consolidated its base among these castes by invoking a broader Hindu religious identity and nationalism instead of caste as rallying points. But it was careful to blend this with incentives. In July 2021, the Modi government announced 27 per cent reservation for OBC students in medical and dental courses under the all-India quota. The income limit for the creamy layer among the OBCs was also revised upwards from Rs 6 lakh to Rs 8 lakh. Even the National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC) got constitutional status under the Modi regime.In 2021, the government also introduced the Constitution (127th) Amendment Bill to restore the power of the states to draw up their own OBC lists after the Supreme Court set aside the Maharashtra government’s decision to grant quota to the Marathas. Maharashtra deputy chief minister and BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis has recently promised to reinstate the quota. Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat has also said that the organisation supports reservations “as provided in the Constitution”, a rather conspicuous U-turn from his 2015 position when he called for a “social review” of the reservation policy. There is also speculation that the Modi government may offer sub-categorisation of the 27 per cent OBC reservation as reportedly suggested by the Justice G. Rohini Commission. The commission was appointed in 2017 to examine the extent of the inequitable distribution of reservation benefits among the OBCs included in the central list, work out the mechanism for sub-categorisation within such OBCs and also recommend correction of any error in the central list. It submitted its report to President Droupadi Murmu on July 31. (Photo: Getty Images) The objective of sub-categorisation is to ensure that reservation benefits are not restricted only to certain numerically strong castes under the OBC umbrella. A 2018 working paper prepared by the Rohini Commission found that certain OBC castes such as Yadav, Kurmi, Jat, Saini, Thevar, Ezhava and Vokkaliga had cornered 97 per cent of the reserved jobs while a massive 37 per cent of the total OBC castes had no representation at all in the reserved seats. According to reports, the commission has suggested 3-4 sub-categorisations within the OBC quota to accommodate all castes.Sub-categorisation of OBC castes is not a new concept per se. Eleven states, including Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Bihar, J&K, Haryana and Puducherry, already have it. Nitish has reaped rich dividends from the sub-categorisation of ignored Dalit castes such as Mahadalits in Bihar. The BJP, which initially followed the same path in UP, now fears that slicing the OBC quota could alienate the dominant OBC castes that had started moving towards the party, or whom it is keen to appropriate. Also, as Prashant K. Trivedi, associate professor at the Lucknow-based Giri Institute of Developmental Studies, points out, “The BJP might have realised that sub-categorisation could prove to be counterproductive, since a number of dominant OBC castes now support the party.” What could work for the BJP is the fact that the Bihar survey does not necessarily reflect any profound change in the demographic distribution of the Hindu backward classes. According to Prof. J.K. Bajaj, former chairperson of the Indian Council for Social Sciences Research and also a member of the Rohini Commission, the survey estimates Bihar’s Hindu OBC groups to be 46 per cent of the population, two percentage points higher than the Mandal Commission estimate of 44 per cent, since it also counts Banias among the OBCs. “It’s after adding 17 per cent Muslim OBCs that the total backward class count jumped to 63 per cent. The Mandal Commission had pegged them at 8 per cent, taking the total OBC count to 52 per cent.” However, the biggest thing in the BJP’s favour could be the caste identity of the prime minister himself, who is a “Modh-Ghanchi”, a caste that traditionally ran kirana shops and oil-pressing units and was granted OBC status in 1994.THE LOGJAMS AHEADThe Opposition’s enthusiasm for a caste census and the BJP’s reluctance for it stem from the prospect of triggering new caste assertions and possibly changing electoral outcomes. Opposition parties argue that a caste census with updated and accurate data will pave the way for a reservation policy that truly reflects social justice. Even the NCBC has recommended a caste census. It won’t be that simple, though. A caste census is certain to increase competitive demands for more reservation, and by more communities. Already, it is felt that the OBCs, numbering 52 per cent in 1931, deserve more than the 27 per cent reservation they currently get in government jobs and education, especially since the Bihar caste survey indicates that their number could be far higher. Already, Nitish is demanding a quota within women’s reservation for OBC women.At any rate, the government cannot arbitrarily increase the share of OBC reservation due to a legal roadblock. In 1992, the Supreme Court ruled that caste-based reservation in jobs cannot exceed 50 per cent. Since SCs STs corner 23 per cent, there is little scope for any hike in the OBC share. Almost all Opposition parties have demanded that this cap be now removed through parliamentary intervention. Several state governments have in the past breached this cap by extending reservations to various communities for political convenience, even though the judiciary has overturned most such attempts.There are logistical hurdles as well. For one, any such exercise cannot be conducted in a hurry. And given the long lead time it will entail, it could well end up becoming a ‘jumla’ like the women’s reservation bill, to be implemented sometime in the future and riddled with numerous ifs and buts. There are also inconsistencies in the official classification of some caste groups. The Jats, for instance, enjoy OBC status in Rajasthan but not in Haryana or in the central list. In states like Karnataka, Rajasthan, MP, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra, even some Brahmins find a place in the list of OBCs. In the South, Reddys are backward in Karnataka but not in other states. Besides, several dominant caste groups, such as the Patidars in Gujarat, the Marathas in Maharashtra and the Jats in Haryana have been agitating, often violently, demanding OBC status. Any count without resolving these contentious demands may create a bigger mess for the Centre. “A nationwide caste census is not feasible. Caste count must happen at the state level,” says Prof. Bajaj.The BJP itself is open to the idea of states conducting a caste census but only for the purpose of “designing welfare programmes better”. And so BJP’s OBC Morcha chief Laxman wants every state to conduct a caste census, while former Bihar deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi even claims credit for the Bihar caste survey saying the decision was taken when the BJP was part of the coalition government led by the JD(U).Ruling governments at the Centre have always been reluctant to conduct a nationwide caste census, both during the UPA regime, and now under the National Democratic Alliance rule, afraid perhaps of a redux of the 1990 insurrection. That perhaps explains why successive governments have hesitated from releasing the results of the 2011 SECC data. In 2021, the Modi government rejected a demand from the Maharashtra government to share the data, saying it was “unusable”. It’s a different matter that the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India had, in 2016, informed the Standing Committee on Rural Development that 98.87 per cent of the data on individual caste and religion in SECC was “error-free”.After over three decades, Mandal’s conundrums have returned to haunt the country’s socio-political landscape. Caste injustice is an unfortunate reality in India and countering it requires a sustained and concerted effort to raise awareness as well as hone sensibilities. A headcount may well provide a more accurate picture of socio-economic disparities, but the demand for it, or its rejection, should not flow from short-term electoral imperatives. The social justice agenda of the country has long been held hostage to vote bank politics. Mandal 2.0 seems to be headed in the same direction.—With Anilesh S. Mahajan, Amitabh Srivastava and Arkamoy Datta MajumdarCAPTAIN OF THE CASTESBihar CM Nitish Kumar bowls another googly with the caste survey results, putting the bjp on the back foot and catapulting himself to centre stage againBy Amitabh Srivastava Bihar CM Nitish Kumar; (Photo: Getty Images) Nitish Kumar likes to wear his watch with the dial on the inside of the wrist. If you ask him why, he might dismiss it as just an old habit, but it’s one way to keep an eye on the time without others noticing. On October 2, Gandhi Jayanti day, the Janata Dal (United) boss and Bihar chief minister again showed his keen sense of timing as his government released the data it had collected from the caste count conducted earlier this year.It could have done so immediately after the Supreme Court, on September 6, adjourned the hearing of petitions challenging it, but Nitish waited for the BJP to play its card with the Women’s Reservation Bill before dealing the caste count blow. The saffron party’s somewhat confused response to the gambit in Bihar—Union minister Giriraj Singh called it an attempt to mislead the masses, former deputy CM Sushil Modi claimed equal credit for the exercise while state BJP president Samrat Choudhary and former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad alleged that the numerical strength of the castes opposed to Nitish and Rashtriya Janata Dal patriarch Lalu Prasad Yadav has been manipulated—underlines how difficult it has become for the BJP to articulate a consistent political response.With the caste survey confirming overwhelming numbers in favour of the backwards (63.1 per cent in Bihar), Nitish’s demand for a quota within quota under women’s reservation could gain momentum and neutralise the BJP’s ‘masterstroke’. This quantifiable confirmation of data could also see the OBC and EBC (Extremely Backward Classes, a subdivision in the OBC categorisation) preferring regional parties over national parties like the BJP as they seek more (proportional) representation in Parliament.“The survey throws up many pertinent questions. For instance, why do the privileged caste Rajputs, with just 3.4 per cent of the population, have the maximum number (seven of the total 40) of Lok Sabha MPs from Bihar? Why do the Yadavs, who make up four times the Rajputs in numbers, have just 5 MPs? These questions can force political parties to rethink their electoral strategies,” says a senior JD(U) leader. If the demand for proportionate representation starts growing, the parties will be forced to rejig their responses accordingly. This could make and unmake careers. THE CASTE SURVEY HAS SHAKEN UP THE POLITICAL SCENE WHEN MANY THOUGHT NITISH’S DAYS AS A SOCIAL ENGINEERING SPEARHEAD WERE OVER There are two distinct components to the caste survey. The largest chunk of the OBCs is the Yadavs, the support base identified with Tejashwi Yadav’s RJD. The caste group was always seen as the single-largest, but the authentication (14.3 per cent) is expected to consolidate them even more, which could close the door on the BJP’s dreams of making a decent dent in the RJD’s vote base.The second is the EBC or the ati pichhda population, made up of 112 castes from among the most marginalised OBCs in Bihar. The news that they make up 36 per cent of the population can make these caste groups more homogeneous than before when it comes to poll choices.In his heyday, when RJD supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav used to quip, “Ballot box se djinn niklega” to counter the doomsday predictions, the djinn he was referring to was the support from the EBCs. The EBCs, who for long failed to unite into a single political entity, used to back Lalu in elections in the '90s. That changed after Nitish’s innings began in November 2005. He carved the EBCs out of the Mandal bloc and breathed new life into the idea of empowerment by first offering them a stake in local governance (with 20 per cent reservation), and then expanding it with financial assistance to meritorious EBC youth interested in civil services or setting up businesses. The survey results could now add more support groups to Nitish’s EBC base, especially those who, for the first time, feel they can assert their numerical strength.The caste survey results have rocked the political scene when many thought Nitish's days as a social engineering spearhead were over after his party punched below its weight in the 2020 assembly polls. But within three years, he is back centre stage as the biggest social justice champion of them all.Top JD(U) sources say Nitish believes the 50 per cent cap on reservation is the biggest impediment to states extending equitable opportunities to the OBCs. Nitish has spoken about this while making a case for a nationwide caste census, but the arguments are not without a political spin. Having dumped the BJP in August 2022, he is now credited with bringing together the national opposition INDIA alliance. The alliance will look to use the survey findings to puncture the BJP, which derives its electoral strength from portraying a picture of Hindu homogeneity versus the other.The aftershocks of the Bihar caste survey are already visible, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi attacking the Opposition (of course without mentioning the survey) for dividing the country along caste lines. There is a strong perception in the opposition camp that the quota plank can queer the BJP’s Hindutva pitch, which has helped it make inroads into sections of the EBCs.In fact, this could well be the most valid reason why the BJP appears unwilling to conduct an all-India caste census, for it could open a Pandora’s box for them. All this then positions Nitish as the man of the moment. Could it be that he has found the chink in the BJP’s armour? If the issue snowballs in the coming months, and if the electoral dice fall in INDIA's favour, we could well see the Bihar CM in a different, national avatar. Indeed, he could become as indispensable to the country as he currently is to Bihar.Published By: Aditya Mohan WigPublished On: Oct 6, 2023Must Watch

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