No Child Left Behind: Tehelka Style

Textbook revisions remain a contentious issue in most "free" cultures. People realize that school students are a captive audience. Catch 'em young, you got a vote bank. Costs much less than an election campaign. Much better when the Government foots the bill.

In the United States, there is a procedure for requesting changes to textbooks. Since this is the richest and most powerful nation on the earth, you would expect that phonies and ideologues have no chance of getting malicious changes approved. It so happened that some Hindus (citizens of United States) wanted some changes made to California textbooks. Most of the changes were denied, certain stuff like "monkey God" etc. were removed. Minor issue, right?

Well, our folks at Tehelka had their panties in a bunch over this matter. A matter of another sovereign country (a much better Governed one at that), and these idiots were acting like Christ was being crucified again.

Fast forward a few years. Now the people friendly Government is in power. Naturally all textbook revisions are suitably rolled back and then some. Please check out the current NCERT texts which describe Indira Gandhi as the benevolent charismatic leader who worked hard to alleviate poverty and bravely fought to liberate Bangladesh. The less said about the Economics and Social Sciences texts, the better.

So, what are our friendly enlightened secular guys up to these days? Check out a sample paragraph from the Tehelka Foundation:

With one’s defenses down, we begin to play….we laugh together, fight one another, challenge everything….as we learn…..about the concept of “Be-ing” versus “Acting”, about visualization as a Tool of receiving energies – of a character, a script, a space….And as we drop our masks for the group to see our vulnerability, we venture into territory we had never explored before…..We discover the Power of Choice – My choice.

If this does not sound cultist to you, I don't know what will.

Meditation for us, is a State of Being – a state of Relaxed Alertness.It is not an activity about concentration, or about denial of the outside world.Its about Letting Go..

The above is for the consumption of 12-year old kids. Their young vulnerable minds are subjected to various hypnosis techniques to enliven them to receive a specific message.

I made a graphics of the site's "mission" statement. This is an edited version, the real one is here.


You can imagine the furor if BJP or RSS made a move like this to recruit cadets from the grassroots level.

After the highly successful Tehelka Education Summit, which featured Shri Arjun Singh, Hon'ble Minister of Human Resource Development as chief guest and which was endorsed by UNESCO, Tehelka has now set its eyes on bigger things.

Tehelka Foundation is joined by an assorted list of NGOs, all tax exempt and feature high society people as their promoters. They will inflitrate all schools in the country. Kids who do not join their network will be marginalized. Those who join this scheme will get strong experience letters for social work such as this. Letters that will prove to be critical for admission to foreign schools. Note the point under strategy: The network becomes larger and stronger each year. This is not a strategy and looks out of place. This is what their vision is.

Before you know it, Tehelka will become the official spokesperson of the Government - India's one stop window to the world.

Hope they had a Prenup

It didn't take Congress anytime at all before jumping into the bed with the Commies. After the reservation gambit and initial signs of public support, they perhaps thought they could say triple talaq and get rid of the lefties. They are the ones who pushed for SEZs, but as soon as things started to get hot, they tried pulling the rug from under the Left.

Well, I guess only time will tell but hope they are not left high and dry like J.K. Rowling's husband.

Do you like Tandoori Chicken?

The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the death sentence on former Congress leader Sushil Sharma, who was convicted in the sensational tandoor murder case.

A Bench of Justices S B Sinha and Markandey Katju, while admitting the appeal filed by Sharma, who killed his wife Naina Sahni in 1995, referred the matter to a three-judge Bench for further hearing.

I urge you to forego Tandoori chicken for at least a week, in protest against these political figures getting off too easy even after committing gruesome crimes.


I kinda lost my appetite.

A sliver of hope - from France

In his well-researched book America Alone: The End of The World As We know it, Mark Steyn presents a very stark future for Europe. Stark indeed, since for the last few years, the most popular baby name in all major European cities was Mohammed.

India or China will not face this problem anytime soon since we have a pretty healthy birth rate in non-Muslim population. But if the current status quo continues, Many Western European countries will have a majority Muslim population within the next few decades, even sooner.

You can try this thought experiment: suppose India's Muslim and Hindu population gets switched (i.e. 13.6% Hindu and 80% Muslim etc.). What do you think is going to happen? Will we remain a democracy? Will we survive as a one big happy family? Will we remain a "secular" nation?

Among the Euro countries, the problem in France was particularly acute. A combination of socialism and Muslim appeasement led them to the current jam they are in. Unemployment soared to 8.7%, highest among Euro nations. The Muslim immigrants, mainly from Algeria and other assorted problem countries bring with them a host of social problems. The veil happened to be the most garden variety controversy, there were issues of honor killing and "tournante".

Then, there were the riots and car burnings. The issue was mostly played down by the socialist apologist Government. But Paris was burning.

Fortunately, France got a new leader, a conservative who can finally show some light. While he may not be able to avert the imminent demographic doom that Europe faces as a whole, he can at least slow it down and do the right thing when necessary.

So, how did the socialists in France embrace a democratic verdict?

Right after his victory, angry youths burned cars and clashed with police in several cities. Police reported Monday that 730 cars were burned and at least 592 people detained overnight across the country, while some 78 officers were injured.

On Monday night, several hundred people massed for a second night at the Place de la Bastille in Paris, breaking windows in shops and starting street fires. Riot police dispersed them.

We face such huge problems with a mere 13.6% of population, just imagine what those Europeans will have to face with a mother load of Muslims. This is a problem we can not ignore. With Islam gaining super power status, the whole power equation of the world will change. It will affect our lives in ways we can not even begin to imagine.

Are they blogging or working?

Recently there has been a huge uproar over encounter killings by cops. The case gets murkier and murkier. This is nothing new, except that depending on the political flavor of the day some of them are hailed as heroes (and sometimes even made protagonists of Bollywood movies) while the others derided as the scum of the earth. The truth remains that too many cops are on the take.

Some people suggest that poor pay and benefits lead cops into the arms of evil elements of the society. In any case, the common consensus appears to be that no matter what, if you are a Government employee, poor pay can not be an excuse for taking the law into your hands.

While it is quite easy to look down upon the acts (which are by definition heinous) of these cops , very few questions are raised about the extra-curricular activities of other Government officers.

A professor from a national institute blogs away in fury, on subjects that has nothing to do with what he teaches. He appears to make strong political statements. Nothing wrong with that. Except that he has more than one blog. And he also collaborates on several group blogs. And he also writes for national newspapers. And he blogs way more than some well-known career journalists in terms of both volume and frequency. And a lot of his blog posts appear at times when he should have been at work (for instance on Friday, May 4th, he posted at 9:12 AM, 1:33 PM, 1:42 PM and 6:06 PM).

One must wonder if all this blogging-shogging is being done on the professor's personal time. Are these blogs being created on computers that are public property? Are the TAs and doctoral students being used to do his political research? Do we have an ethical standard on these issues?

There is nothing wrong when professors take up assignments outside their academic life. For instance, IIM professors are allowed to take up consultancy assignments on the side. But when they actively participate in partisan politics, they are treading a very thin line and dangerously straddling their public and private lives. This is a sensitive matter, they have a captive audience of students who must keep the professor happy to get good grades. We feel that the HRD ministry should come up with a comprehensive and objective guideline to clear these issues.

The same thing used to apply to a certain female IAS officer. Her now defunct old blog often grew by several dozen entries per day. Her blog was testimony to the dozens of books, magazines and movies she consumed every week. She also wrote movie reviews and articles for several magazines. Yours truly made a ballpark estimate, unless the said IAS officer had no life then, her blogging must have penetrated deep into her public life and time, spent on taxpayers' money. Fortunately, she seems to have shifted gears now. A few entries every other day. Reasonable enough for someone who has an important day job.

As our country moves towards modernity and gradually destroys all the ills of religious fundamentalism, such as Hindutva, we must be ready to embrace the new ethical dilemmas. Web 2.0 is a great opportunity, a great leveler for the rich and the poor alike, but we mustn't allow Politics 2.0 hold it in ransom.

Are you feeling delusional?

A 16 year old girl.
Brutally raped.
For over three months.
By a cop.
By a Muslim (minority) cop. Assistant sub-inspector Mohammad Aalam
Who uses his service revolver to terrorize the family.
He fires in the air to drive away the family members.
All this in the people friendly state of Jharkhand.
Run by tribal leaders.
In a nation called India.
Jharkhand police chief J B Mahapatra has "sought details" of the case.
(Socialist Response: clap clap clap)

All Hindutva's fault? Modi to blame again? Oh, I get it, we must be sensitive to them and allow them to reform themselves. Till how long? After how many Hindu women are raped? After how many OBCs avail reservations?

Why is this not even reported by socialists? Why is a monster being allowed to destroy the AIIMS while our greatest self-styled Education expert remains silent? Meanwhile take a look at what the Monster's greatest fan says:

ALL MULTIPLE Choice Exams are biased against women in the same way all memory based exams (where marks depend also on the "presentation" of answers) are biased against men.

What? While the same self-styled Educationist makes a salvo of posts on IIT-JEE's alleged gender bias?

Then, get this, read this very slowly:

If more than one student had obtained the same marks, the following aspects will be taken into account to determine their seniority: percentage of marks in Mathematics; percentage of marks in Physics; percentage of marks in the elective subject; date of birth and random allotment of numbers.

Yeah, I am delusional, just not delusional enough to open the door to a socialist or a Muslim or an OBC or a Dalit without a gun in my hand, and no, I am not talking about the God given one.

Look who's writing your kid's textbooks

Here is a theme music to go with the Pic. Yeah, that's the creepy looking dude in the background.

It is a great tribute to the indefatigable Bezawada Wilson, and a small ego massage for me, that my short article about him in Tehelka has been reprinted by Oxford University Press (India) in a class VIII textbook on "Social and Political Life".

Sure you want your kids to read that book?

Flashback:

No Mr Confused, you are living under my dictatorship. My name is Adolf Hitler II. You are a Jew who will soon be exterminated. Don't Panic.

Want some candy?

Flashback:

Shoummo, while you're right that there's probably not enough news about rural India in our papers, I'm not so sure it requires the papers to actually have "rural reporters" on their staff. That Cal daily you're talking about, last time I checked some years ago (I used to get it at home here in Bom) did make an attempt to have some serious news, often about rural India. (And I promise you -- saying so has nothing to do with the fact that I won one of those rural reporting award a few years ago).

Who said this and where?

Single celled animals that were created by accidents of nature gradually evolved into the complex animals that we see today. For instance cows, donkeys etc. What caused this? Darwin explained it quite satisfactorily.

The biggest, baddest and meanest of 'em all outran dangers, outfought one another when food became scarce, mounted the most females and thus came to dominate the others. Something like that. Of course it is not so simple, it never is.

Human beings still remain a mystery. Especially our highly evolved social, emotional attributes and intelligence. We send rockets to the moon and write complex passages like the one quoted above while our next best cousin from the animal kingdom can merely do cutesy acts in a circus. What can explain this anomaly?

Richard Alexander provides a solution which is outlined in this paper. Pages 8 through 12 is just about what you need. These few pages allows a highly evolved specimen of the human species to invoke Machiavelli, Gujarat and Darfur in the same essay and get cheers from the socialist crowd. He gets his headline and a fair amount of content. Why bother with the rest?

The proposition is clear. We can be better human beings. We can stop competing so fiercely and be kind to one another. Everybody happy. The question is, if I play ball, who will guarantee that others will play ball too? I will drop my gun. Its just that I prefer you to drop yours first.

Update: It appears that we learned quite a few tricks hundreds of thousands of years before Machiavelli.

Nah, I'd rather be human

Read more here.

Johny mera naam

Why do I have a Déjà vu?

Mumbai municipal commissioner Johny Joseph was appointed as state chief secretary yesterday, superseding Jadhav and few other IAS officers who were senior to Joseph.

Gadkari admitted that seniority is not the sole criterion in chief secretary's selection, but lamented that Jadhav, "the seniormost, most performing" officer was sidelined in the process.

He also pointed out that Jadhav, apart from being a woman, also belonged to Scheduled Caste.

Not appointing Jadhav as Chief Secretary had exposed the "hypocrisy" of the Congress-NCP regime which claimed to be progressive, Gadkari said at a press conference here.

I suppose only a Christian Chief Secy can keep the recalcitrant Hindoos of Bombay in check. Just like another one did, decades ago. His son continues the crusade.

I don't have tags enabled on my blog, but here are a few possibilites:

Social Justice, Biases against women, Dalit and woman - double whammy, Hindutva, Minorities, feminists etc. etc.

Now in theatres

But the movie about the Dravidian icon, who preached rationalism, had to endure irrational objections from today's political parties.

The PMK started it all when they objected to actress Khushboo playing the role of Periyar's wife Maniyammai, a hangover from the PMK's agitation against her regarding her comments on pre-marital sex.

But despite all the troubles, the movie funded by the Tamil Nadu government has finally released, perhaps an effort to immortalise a man whose followers are today's decision makers.

Such a great leader that no producer was to be found and the Government had to foot the bill (will the TamBrahms get a tax break on this?). I guess sex is verboten for the rationalists too, just like it is for us Religious fundamentalists. Hmmmm.

Update: D'Souza & Co. goes totally biblical in a really weird post. Just replace the biblical references with Hindu scriptures and publish it on your blog. This dude will be sure to respond with just about the only word he knows, which is bullshit. Also take a very close look at this video. Then drink a glass cold water and reflect for a moment.

Since the Indian feminists will not report this...

Some 150,000 women have been detained in Iran for violating strict new Islamic dress code rules, the country's top police officer has announced. "During the first four days [since the code came into effect] we have picked up 150,000 women who were not properly veiled, but many of them were released after they signed an admission of guilt and a formal apology," General Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam told journalists. An unspecified number of the women taken into custody were also forced to undergo psychological counseling, Moghaddam said.

"Only 13 of these women are still being held and they will have to stand trial," he explained.

No prizes for guessing what is happening to those 13 women.

Here is a video of an actual arrest scene:

Link courtesy: Michelle Malkin.

Abi's experiments with the truth

God must be highly biased against sperms. Millions race towards their ultimate salvation, only one makes it. Bias is a heavy word, it is a loaded word and definitely not to be thrown around randomly, especially by amateurs. I have always maintained that there is no real moral argument against communism, followers of Ayn Rand will perhaps disagree. It is quite another matter that true communism has been dreadfully hard to implement. But think about it, socialism is the perfect refuge for scums and manipulators. Dictators are exposed. Kings are vilified. The socialist sits on a moral high ground and passes his judgement. Meanwhile his cash register keeps ringing.

Just how enamored you have to be of your prejudices to be blind to reality to that extent? Abi did it several times in the past and was duly exposed. He does it again and gets his ass handed to him on a platter. Notice how he tries to evade the issue. His next move will be quoting articles with a "liberal" bent from American newspapers and journals ad nauseum.

Spaceman Spiff has done an excellent job of chronicling the whole episode.

Welcome to the $1,000,000,000,000 Club!

India finally joins the exclusive list of rich and privileged countries with a GDP above 1 trillion dollars. Gives you a warm fuzzy feeling, doesn't it? It certainly does, to some of the kids in the picture.

I guess they are happy that we will soon be sending some 33,000 of their token brethren like this one to the finest educational institutes of our country. After all, they made it happen.

Intensive Lessons

One of the pages on this blog that gets a lot of hits is Communist Quotes. I haven't been able to update the page as promised, irking some readers.

Well, despair no more. The guys at Chor-Bharti are doing it for us. For an assortment of the looniest stuff from the socialist block, read that blog regularly.

For the real fun stuff however, you need to go back to the bigger guys, like Dilip D'Souza. For instance, check out this amazing quote from Madam Suzanna Roy:

Nehru and Gandhi were generous men. Their paradigms for development are based on assumptions of inherent morality. Nehru's on the paternal, protective morality of the Soviet-style Centralised State. Gandhi's on the nurturing, maternal morality of romanticised village Republics. Both would work perfectly, if only we were better human beings. If only we all wore khadi and suppressed our base urges - sex, shopping, dodging spinning lessons and being unkind to the less fortunate. Fifty years down the line, it's safe to say that we haven't made the grade. We haven't even come close.

This comes from someone who probably banged half her graduating class in Architecture school and thereafter kept shagging every director that came her way (some twice her age and married too) to land two-bit roles. Her only novel so far features a brother and sister duo who can't keep their hands off each other. She builds bungalows that invites court summons. Some urge control this.

Anyway.

There is a lot of news on the quota front. RealityCheck and Lex are providing good coverage. As usual a lot of people are hopeful that instead of being a temporary obstacle to another socialist ponzi scheme, this may actually yield something good. I am sorry to burst your bubble, the quotas will come, it is a matter of time.

I think the picture is getting a lot clearer now. Soon a law will be enacted to take away the autonomy from IIMs. There is already talk of a constitutional amendment. I believe at the very least, those who made it through the OBC quotas this year will have their seats preserved for the next session. But the Government will try it best to get them in this session.

What this means is that the admissions may get delayed till September, or even December. The guys who make it to IIT/IIMs this year will get a taste of "accelerated learning". Yours truly has some experience in that department. Man, it sucks. Marathon classes at breakneck speed, groupmates screaming that the assignment was due yesterday.

To these students, my advise would be to stay off booze and that playboy magazine. Yeah, it might help to control those urges.

Data is a bitch, lotsa OBCs are rich

Selective amnesia (no violence by OBCs in the pro-quota protests), denial (demand for data is new, no one demanded data before, data is inaccurate, data is sufficient), pretense of extreme naivete (not a vote bank measure), absurd demands (asking individuals to conduct census) conspiracy theories (upper caste judges are biased) and sometimes outright lies and fabrication (exhibit 1, exhibit 2, exhibit 3, exhibit 4 , exhibit 5 - more to follow) - this is the stance the socialists have adopted after the recent stay on their latest ponzi scheme.

As usual an army of experts have descended like vultures to defend the Government's legal position. Psephologist (had to look it up) Yogendra Yadav has his own ideas about how the OBC count should be conducted. Legal expert V. Venkatesan has his own interpretation of the law and verdict, which needless to say contradicts the SC stand.

Indra Sawhney case can not be a legal precedent because,

1. it is about Government jobs, not about admissions to schools
2. simply because it was filed when the 93rd amendment wasn't in place
3. a specific ruling does not automatically preclude all future legal challenges related to the issue

Our constitution is huge. It is growing bigger and bigger. Perhaps someday it will approach the size of the Indian Act. Clearly we are moving away from the accepted norm of a democratic country. The constitution is supposed to provide fundamental principles. The law provides the details. Then comes the executive part, typically a commission and other bodies who implement the law.

You can legally challenge:

1. what is put into the constitution if it is vague, ambiguous, contradictory and/or if it is against the spirit of the fundamental principles
   
2. what is made into laws, if it is vague, ambiguous, incomplete, contradictory and/or if it is not in accordance to the constitution
3. the implementation if it is vague, ambiguous, incomplete, contradictory and/or if it is not in accordance to the constitution and/or if it is not according to the law
   

The Constitution. Consider the 93rd amendment itself:

2. Amendment of article 15.-In article 15 of the Constitution, after clause (4), the following clause shall be inserted, namely:

(5) Nothing in this article or in sub-clause (g) of clause (1) of article 19 shall prevent the State from making any special provision, by law, for the advancement of any socially and educationally backward classes of citizens or for the Scheduled Castes or the Scheduled Tribes in so far as such special provisions relate to their admission to educational institutions including private educational institutions, whether aided or unaided by the State, other than the minority educational institutions referred to in clause (1) of article 30.

As you can see, this scam needed amending one article in the fundamentals section and over-riding two more. Note how many special provisions there are - centrally aided, minority etc. Stretching it a bit thin, aren't we? Note the phrase: socially and educationally backward classes. Doesn't say castes. This is obviously intended to appease Muslims and Christians depending on which assembly election is coming up next. Private institutes are not exempt, minority institutes are.

The Law: Now, the Act itself, namely the The Central Educational Institutions (Reservation in Admission) act, 2006:

3. Reservation of seats in Central Educational Institutions. - The reservation of seats in admission and its extent in a Central Educational Institution shall be provided in the following manner, namely:
[...]
(iii) out of the annual permitted strength in each branch of study or faculty, twenty-seven per cent. seats shall be reserved for the Other Backward Classes.

Note how the socially and educationally backward classes became other backward classes. Now, it would be naive to pretend that such a huge exercise involving a huge legislative body and so many legal experts didn't know what they were doing. They knew exactly what they were doing and that there would be challenges. Also check out the exclusions section. Already there are violent demands to repeal this section.

The Implementation - The National Commission of Backward Classes, some examples:

[...]
(e) Castes and communities, which in terms of caste system, are identified with traditional crafts or traditional or hereditary occupations considered to be lowly or undignified.
[...]
3. Castes and communities, of which the proportion of graduates is at least 20% less than the State or district average.

Note that finally, socially and educationally backward classes becomes Castes and communities. Also note how vague some of the definitions are. Lowly and dignified according to who? See how cleverly the backwardedness criterion is restricted to the state/district level. It is a very clear appeasement of Tamil Nadu politicians. Unfortunately for them, latest data clearly disqualifies either the whole group or at least many of the castes from OBC status.

Technical perhaps, but here is an example. Dr. Ramadoss claimed that the creamy layer should not be excluded because it is not in the constitution. Unfortunately, if you accept the NCBC changing the SEBC to Castes and communities, you have to accept the creamy layer, because it is part of NCBC implementation. Also, the NCBC was set up in 1993 with provisions for examination every 10 years.

The only way some of the technicalities could be trumped is by giving the OBCs the historically oppressed status. The constitution does not yet do so.

There is no way this thing can pass muster in a reasonable legal system and functioning democracy.

You can muscle it in or stall admissions for everyone, but then again do not pretend to be all hoity toity holy upholders of justice. Justice has nothing to do with it. As is well known, the beneficiaries would be dudes like this. Hardly deprived in any sense.

But then again, the whole thing was designed to benefit dudes like that.

Remove Tamil Nadu OBCs from Reservation Eligibility List

Sources:
Indian Constitution
India Government Act
NSSO - National Sample Survey Organization
NCBC - National Commission of (pretending to be) Backward Castes

Note: If you have any questions about the data, please do not hesitate to email us.

Catch-22

{Please click on the images to see a larger version}

In my previous post I analyzed the TN situation with data available from the NSSO 1999-2000 survey. It was pointed out to me that I misunderestimated the urban population percentage. Well, have no fear, the exact figures are available from the 2001 census. Now, the contention was that urban population is less than what I had claimed. Now I am using data even more recent than the NSSO figures, so there is no scope for dispute. You can say that ideally I should use the latest rural/urban population percentage but it will distort the picture since the educational survey figures are from 1999-2000.

As you can see above, TN OBCs as a whole do not qualify the NCBC criteria. I also repeated the analysis by varying the backwardedness among the 181 OBC castes assuming a Normal distribution:


Here is another chart, this time it compares TN OBCs with All India average:


In light of the recent developments, people are reacting strangely, which is understandable. Some folks believe that data exists and it is adequate. Some others believe the NSSO data is grossly inaccurate. Then there are absurd questions being asked.

Meanwhile, our esteemed leaders still do not want a caste based census. Our PM is down to hopes and prayers now.

For the rest of India, the NSSO data does not prove anything conclusive. When these surveys were done, the quotas were already in effect for decades. The only way to find out is by conducting a rigorous caste based census. This data will then need to be analysed against a caste based survey of student population and an expanded rank list of entrance examinations (say 10 times the number actually admitted).

This exercise however is a question of political will and honesty. No one knows what the data might reveal. The conjecture is that we will see that some dominant OBC castes are not backward at all and that these castes monopolize most of the reserved seats. For politicians it is a classic catch-22 situation. To fight the SC stay they need reasonable data. Reasonable data might threaten their political careers.

The right question to ask is, do you want quota or do you want social justice?

Cold stare of hard data

{Please click on the images to view a larger version.}

This is the data available from the NSSO Report 1999 - 2000 for education levels across social groups. This is the latest data available for educational attainment, although more recent figures are available as far as the OBC count is concerned. The first two segments (urban and rural) are quoted verbatim from the report. I calculated the total figures, by using a population weighted average.

Let's recap the NCBC education criteria for qualifying as OBC:

1. Castes and communities, whose literacy rate is at least 8% less than the State or district average.
2. Castes and communities of which the proportion of matriculates is at least 20% less than the State or district average.
3. Castes and communities, of which the proportion of graduates is at least 20% less than the State or district average.

For the moment we will ignore the district and the community part. Too vague, besides no district level data is available anyway. We also take a conservative estimate and assume an OR condition for the above although NCBC does not elaborate. For Mandal, you had to qualify in all the above.

If you look at the image above, you will see that the OBCs actually lead (or just marginally lag) the state average in almost all counts, except in the numbers for graduates per thousand. Overall in TN there are 38 graduates per thousand OBCs as opposed to the state average of 42 per thousand which is about a 10% lag. This clearly indicates that some OBC castes will not qualify the NCBC criteria. Only in the urban areas, OBCs lag the state average by about 25% in terms of graduates per thousand. But that fact alone does not qualify all OBC castes for quotas, even by the conditions laid down by NCBC.

A summary of the above is as follows.

I did some further calculations, just to arrive at a ballpark estimate of how many OBC castes might actually qualify. Absent the exact numbers for each caste, this seems to be hard to do. However, you can easily assume a normal distribution for the graduates per thousand figure for different castes. This is valid under central limit theorem. We have the overall average, which is 38 per thousand. We also know that to qualify, a caste needs to have less than 33.6 graduates per thousand (42 state average, less 20%). We also know TN has about 181 distinct OBC groups. Thus, all you need to do is assume different standard deviations and determine how many castes might qualify.

Obviously, you can not really go beyond a standard deviation of about 13, but I computed it anyway. As you can see, at best 60 - 70 caste groups can qualify.

I did the same thing, this time for the urban numbers only. The relevant numbers are: 68 per thousand (OBC), 91 per thousand (state average) and 72.8 (91 less 20%) to qualify.

Here also there is no need to go beyond 23 for the StDev. If we just take urban figures, about 100 out of 181 caste groups just might qualify.

A caveat of this analysis is that much of the numbers include those who are currently availing quotas. In which case there is no way to find out unless we repeal the quotas for a few years, which I am sure is not going to happen.

Of course everyone knows that in TN the quotas are being cornered by a dozen or so rich and powerful OBCs. But the socialists will never admit to it nor will they let anyone conduct a proper statistical survey of all relevant information. The quotas will remain a slap on the face of the truly backward.

The Chor-Bharti Bloggers are a lot of fun

The Chor-Bharti guys are a lot of fun. First they link to a post from RealityCheck in their humor section. Then Shivam Vij finds a streak of violence in Reality Check. I suppose Shivam is the most peace-loving guy in the universe.

You have to give it to those guys though, if there is one thing they believe in, it is the idea that the sheer number of posts or links strengthen ones argument. Quite obviously the SC stay on the quotas didn't go down well with the socialist lobby. Apparently questioning the validity of using an almost century old survey makes one racist.

I have always maintained that quotas of any form are a gross aberration. They are immoral by their very design. In any case, the constitution recognizes quotas in its current avatar (what happened to the promised review process every 10 years, God only knows). Like it or not, at some point or other you are going to see rich OBC kids waltzing into our nation's premier institutes.

Apparently the Chor-Bharti folks believe the caste list is valid in its entirety and enough data exists to prove it. It is easy to see that no real data exists, first about the real count of OBCs, second about which ones among them are even eligible. As a matter of fact, there is no objective guideline that exists about the definition of SEBC.

First, a brief comparison of the original Mandal criteria and the current NCBC guidelines:

Mandal Educational:

Castes/classes where the number of children in the age group of 5-15 years who never attended school is at least 25 per cent above the state average. Castes/classes where the rate of student drop-out in the age group of 5-15 years is at least 25 per cent above the state average. Castes/classes amongst whom the proportion of matriculates is at least 25 per cent below the state average.

NCBC Educational:

1. Castes and communities, whose literacy rate is at least 8% less than the State or district average.
2. Castes and communities of which the proportion of matriculates is at least 20% less than the State or district average.
3. Castes and communities, of which the proportion of graduates is at least 20% less than the State or district average.

You can easily see that they diluted the criteria without asking, on the sly. 25% became 20%, while it should have been the other way around. Perhaps the biggest con job is how the various criteria will be applied. Mandal had a point system for social, educational and economic criteria. The current guildelines do not state anything in this regard. The definitions are extremely vague. What does district level average mean? If some dudes are backward in one district, does that make them eligible statewide? How about the disparities between the states? You can not pretend to be backward in one state and claim your share in a national institute.

The current guidelines are grossly inadequate and non-objective. Forget about the current stay, if one OBC dude sues the center for being thrown out of the list while another gets the benefits, the Government does not have a legal leg to stand on. Meanwhile, the Economic criteria fell through the cracks. No one is even talking about that anymore.

Clearly some powerful OBC groups are cornering most of the benefits. For details, please see my next post.