After making Nirav Modi and Brahmin Vijay Mallya escape India with 1000s of crores, BJP government is ready to sell Air India. BJP government has decided to sell 76% stake in Air India on 28th May 2018 and with that reservation will come to end as private companies have never followed the rules of reservation.

Air India is a classic case of mismanagement and successive governments making it ineffective and alienating users from using it. It is another attempt by Brahminical BJP/RSS to make reservation ineffective by the privatization of Air India.

Till today, BJP/RSS has been giving arguments that only loss-making public companies are being sold but Air India’s operating profit had increased more than double as per the reports. So, intentions of BJP/RSS are clear, it is an attempt to end reservation, nothing else. After diluting SC/ST Act and making it ineffective, ending reservation for SC/ST/OBCs is next goal of RSS/BJP government.

It is not hidden that jobs in private sector are given on the basis of the ‘surname’ and contacts within the company. How many SC/STs have contacts in the private companies, who would help them get jobs in private companies? The answer would be negligible.

It is also a fact that private companies hate reservation despite many studies showing that diversity has improved productivity. So, merely giving the logic that reservation would hurt productivity in private companies is just bullshit and hold no water. So, privatization of Air India is nothing but an attempt by RSS/BJP to sideline SC/ST/OBCs and deprive them of the benefits of reservation.

It is a time to make serious demands of reservation in private sector if the government is giving benefits from cheap loans to cheap land to other sops to private companies then why shouldn’t there be reservation in private sector? Private companies should be made responsible for adhering to the reservation policies as per the constitution of India.

World-renowned Nobel Prize winner economist Elinor Ostrom (she is the first woman to be awarded the Nobel in Economics!) has proved that public resources can be managed by the public more effectively. She gave 8 principles for managing properly, and one of that is ensuring that those affected by the rules can participate in modifying the rules. Do we see such thing in India that those affected by the rule on selling Air India been participating? No.

Privatisation is not a solution for Air India, the national carrier is the symbol of country’s pride and it has a brand value. It creates an image of the country. If privatisation is good then why these private companies are failed to pay back the banks loan?

The reality of Reservation in India

Government sector jobs have been decreasing after 1991 liberalization policy of the government and on the other hand jobs in private sector are increasing. Most of the jobs today in India are in an unorganized sector where there is no reservation.

We demand if there be privatization of any public company, new owners be made responsible for fulfilling the reservation guidelines.

[irp]