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Spirited Away..
10 years ago
I normally donot directly Cltr - C , Cltr - V others' posts on my blog. But this one is simply fantabulous. I got this from a colleague. It just said EmCee's diary. If anyone knows who EmCee is, please let me know. I shall be more than glad to acknowledge such fine writing...
An excerpt from Emcee's diary exactly 50 years from now
Ahmedabad, 30 April 2056: I attended the bash at the IIM-OBC Alumni
association to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the reservation of
seats for OBCs (Other Backward Castes) in IIMs. Since I'm not an OBC, I
was not supposed to attend, but at present, we MBFCs (Moderately
Backward Forward Castes) together with the Non-Scheduled Tribes have a political alliance with the OBCs. We sipped champagne and talked about
how so many of us had progressed from reserved seats in the IIMs to
reserved jobs to reserved promotions. Unfortunately, the party broke up
when a Non-scheduled Tribes faculty member objected to the OBCs dancing
with all the pretty girls - he wanted equal opportunities for every
caste at each dance. I pointed out that the Non-scheduled Tribes had
exceeded the quota of champagne reserved for them. The party ended in a pitched caste battle.
1) May 2056: Today, I became president of the IIM Board of Directors.
Under the present rotating presidency system, a member of each caste is
made the president by turn. When it was the turn of the MBFCs for
president, they had to choose me because I'm the only MBFC on the
campus. True, I'm only the campus dhobi, but then every caste must be
given an equal opportunity.
All those centuries of oppression by the OSBFCs (Only Slightly Backward
Forward Castes) and the OFCs (Other Forward Castes) must be rectified. I hope to restore the high standards at IIM - I overheard some foreigners
calling it the Indian Institute of Morons, the other day.
2) May 2056: They've announced the cricket team for the series against
Australia. I was overjoyed when they chose an MBFC man as captain. But
my hopes were dashed when I realised he was a Most Backward Forward
Caste and not a Moderately Backward Forward Caste. The selection
committee lamented that it was gross discrimination that no member from
the Jarowa tribe (the Stone Age tribe in the Andamans) had ever found a place in the Indian cricket team. A squad has since been dispatched to the Andamans to capture a Jarowa tribal to play in the national team. I hope he will improve their performance - they had an innings defeat against the Maldives recently. I would have played myself except for the fact that I lost a leg some years ago when I was
in hospital with a toothache and a doctor recruited through the
Unscheduled Caste quota extracted my leg instead of my tooth.
3) May 2056: There are too many NFCs (Neo-Forward castes) in the IT
business. Under the terms of the Business Reservation Act, their firms
will now be taken over by the other castes. I hope they will be able to
restore the Indian IT industry back to its former glory. For some
unfathomable reason, it has gone down the drain after job reservations
were implemented.
I went for a movie featuring star actor Mungeri Ram. He may lack teeth,
be four-feet-three and have hair growing out of his nose, but this year
it's the turn of the EBC-RYs (Extremely Backward Caste-Rural Yokels) to
be stars and Mungeri Ram is the best of the lot. I wonder why foreign
movies have become so popular.
4) May 2056: A truly great day. We now have an OFBMBC (Other Forward But Moderately Backward Caste) general as the Head of the Armed Forces. I hope he'll be able to win back the territory we lost ever since reservations were implemented in the Army. Since then, the north has been taken by Pakistan, the North-east by China, the east by Bangladesh and the south by Sri Lanka and the Maldives. Only last winter, we lost
the war against Bhutan and free India is now limited to the western
coastal states. But I'm sure the OFBMBC general will turn the tide.
5) May 2056: My wife and I have been blessed with a bonny daughter.
Since my wife's an SBBNSBC (Slightly Backward But Not So Backward
Caste), my daughter will be an MBFC-SBBNSBC. I must lobby for
reservation for her caste. She's the only member and I'm sure she has a
great future.
THINK ABOUT IT!!!
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8 Responses
sakat aagide.. wont be surprised if such a thing really happens in 2056
@Art: I shudder to think of it....
What "merit" are we talking of anyway ? Scores in entrance exams at age of 17?
Take the claim of "merit based" entrance to all IIMs and dozens of other institutes.
The CAT exam is based on the SAT exam in the USA . It has been proved beyond doubt that the SAT test is culturally biased . Blacks and hispanics do poorly at it year after year .
If a student who is eligible for admission to IIM on the basis of his CAT score, were to take the same CAT exam in which he/she cleared in a language that he/she did not understand then he/she would be at a disadvantage compared to someone who was schooled in that language . Not knowing that language does not mean you lack the capacity to clear that exam.
Approximately 25 % of CAT test is about English! Another 25 % is about English Comprehension!!!! There you are !!!! About 50 % so called aptitude test is a hoax for someone who is from a non-english speaking background .
This is how the CAT like the SAT is discriminatory .
See the full form of SAT …Scholastic Aptitude Test . The problem is aptitude testing is not so simple . There is no test on earth which can reliably tests aptitude .
Aptitude tests such as the SAT have a historical tie to the concept of innate mental abilities and the belief that such abilities can be defined and meaningfully measured. Neither notion has been supported by modern research. Few scientists who have considered these matters seriously would argue that aptitude tests such as the SAT provide a true measure of intellectual abilities.
It was found that people could be coached to better their scores at SAT . The name SAT …Scholastic Aptitude Test could not be correct . So under such valid criticism the name was changed to Scholastic Assessment Test, since a test that can be coached clearly did not measure inherent "scholastic aptitude", but was influenced largely by what the test subject had learned in school. Even the College Board which conducts the SAT has beaten a hasty retreat.This was a major theoretical retreat by the College Board conducting SAT, which had previously maintained that the test measured inherent aptitude and was free of bias.
About ten years back , however, even the redundancy of the term assessment test was recognized and the name was changed to the neutral, and non-descriptive, SAT. At the time, the College Board announced, "Please note that SAT is not an initialism. It does not stand for anything."
The framers of these SAT tests assumed that intelligence was a unitary inherited attribute, that it was not subject to change over a lifetime, and that it could be measured and individuals could be ranked and assigned their place in society accordingly. The SAT evolved from these questionable assumptions about human talent and potential.
More and more people are questioning the validity of SAT . In the past MENSA used to accept high SAT score individuals . For the past decade it has stopped accepting SAT scores .
The whole exercise of deciding merit based on CAT scores discriminates against those from lower socio-economic status.
Though many non-IIM institutes have started accepting CAT scores, the application fee of these institutes is still inexplicably high.
The CAT is primarily an exam of Math and English. Logical and Analytical Reasoning is nearly absent (except for some verbal reasoning which again depends on knowing English well!!!!).
CAT is a clever way to keep those from lower socio-economic strata away Institutes funded with tax payers money .
So claims of “Merit” based on CAT scores is hollow and discriminatory against those of lower socio-economic strata.
Dhirubhai Ambani had a poor command over English . He would not have made it through CAT. So what "merit" are we talking of?
But Dude, what does that have to wih reservation? We are not speaking about reservation for people with poor english...
How about reservation for the menatally retarded who are poor in english and apti as well?
@Ashu:
i liked ur article so much that i have posted it in my blog as well..but of course with the link..
@anonymous:
"The whole exercise of deciding merit based on CAT scores discriminates against those from lower socio-economic status." -- what made u think so? A person with a good english knowledge and a good aptitude should definitely get an admission irrespective of his caste and creed! Just by giving reservations, a dumb person who cannot probably do addition properly or cannot speak a sentence in english properly cannot come up in life.. This is just my opinion!
@Ashu:
i liked ur article so much that i have posted it in my blog as well..but of course with the link..
@anonymous:
"The whole exercise of deciding merit based on CAT scores discriminates against those from lower socio-economic status." -- what made u think so? A person with a good english knowledge and a good aptitude should definitely get an admission irrespective of his caste and creed! Just by giving reservations, a dumb person who cannot probably do addition properly or cannot speak a sentence in english properly cannot come up in life.. This is just my opinion!
AAAxxelent!
Every day I listen to someone in the government, I think "WTF is going on?". Starting from Weepy Singh, to the Chewing-gum Always Bihari, and now Man-too-little-to-have-a-useful-stand Singh, everyone is literally ripping our country apart based on stupid brainless actions.
Why can't alumni from the top Indian educational institutes rule this country? Why should someone not as qualified or sensible as the rest of us be ruling over us? I just don't get it. WTF?
@Ash:
Thanks Ash..what is your blog link?