Caste, Politics and Reservation - Part I

Caste based politics is not new to TN, or for that fact for India. The more we say we are casteless, religion neutral secular country, the more we practice casteism. Even in this century, even in this IT age. The popular matrimony sites advertise - database of "x" no of castes, "y" no of communities .....and so on. And we are replete with all kinds of "sangams" (associations) who are supposed to take care of their respective castes and in few cases their respective political parties too.

The story of PMK in TN is too well known to be documented - PMK "graduated" to the most-sought-after political ally (usually for different parties in different elections) from its earlier roots of Vanniyar sangam. They are particularly strong in Northern and part of western districts of TN. Even after some of the most politically opportunistic alliance switching - its political base remained intact and whenever major political parties aligned with it, it got benefited.

Few other caste based parties also tried this route albeit with little success. Most of them remained as "letter pad" parties and used it so called power to bargain with political parties for one or two seats or for nothing (but settled for some cash.)

Most of us say we detest caste based politics, but we dont know from where these guys gain strength and confidence. It is particularly depressing to know that even well known Cinema starts (Karthik, Vivek and now Sarathkumar to name a few) tries to use (exploit) the youth of their caste to promote their benefits. (To be fair to him, Vivek is no longer in the forefront of his caste "sangam", Karthik has made a mockery of a Once-a-Nationalist-party into a caste based outfit and Sarathkumar in a none-too-subtle way is wooing his community people with his political outfit, ironically named with "equality")

Representatives of mainstream political parties also play their own caste games especially on micro level which largely gets unnoticed by the mainstream media or at best ignored.

The main demands of these caste based outfits is for more job opportunities and more educational opportunities (read exclusive reservation) for their community. With TN being one of the "advanced and mature" states in "social equality" (whatever it means) not much tinkering can be done in the existing reservation formula (though PMK was able to extract a significant % in the pretext of MBC). As a result most of the caste based political parties doesn't seem to do much actually to the upliftment or welfare of their community people. Instead it remains as a fringe political force and mostly militant in its way in dealing with the other communities, especially with the oppressed classes (in their region). This trend is particularly disturbing as this has caused the affected parties to join or form an outfit of their own (again with their own caste affiliations). The emergence of PB and VCK in the northern districts and PT in the southern districts is an indication for this (PB - Puthiya Bharatham, VCK - Viduthalai chirruthaigal, PT- Puthiya Tamizhagam ).

As though all this is not enough, TN is witnessing the next wave in the heady cocktail of caste and politics - the emergence of a political outfit for Kongu Vellalars, known as Gounders and the FEBAS, the Federation of Brahmin association of South India.

More on this on the next posting ...