Author – Disha Sharma

Amongst many issues which are still prevalent in contemporary India, there is one which always remains highly debated, that is, caste. There have been numerous heated debates around caste and its implications till now. There are different ideas and different experiences around caste. This article will not address the plethora of experiences or debates around caste but would discuss one popular question-should affirmative action be given on the basis of caste or on the basis of income? This question has always been asked but seems to be the most prevalent currently due to the proposed (now retrieved) act of Dr.B.R.Ambedkar University, Delhi (AUD) on diluting the full fee waiver for SC/ST/OBC/PwD students. The university was proposing to implement the criteria of the income slab provision instead of the earlier full fee waiver to the SC/ST/OBC/PwD from the current session of 2020-21. 

This provision is problematic and exclusionary at different levels. The very assumption behind a dilution of provision for SC/ST/OBC students is that caste is not present and does not affect the lives of people, but it is the income divisions which prevails. What is absent from this thought is the fact that caste is social in nature which affects economic and political factors of a person as well. By ignoring and not acknowledging caste as an influencing factor, the university is sidelining the already marginalized communities. This seems to be a step towards creating inhabitable environments for the already marginalized groups in the higher education spaces which are already inaccessible to many. The harsh reality is that AUD is not alone and not the first public university to dilute the financial aid for the marginalized communities. Even if, after protests, the proposal has been suspended, the question still remains prominent in the higher education area. Public universities such as TISS withdrew certain financial aid from SC/ST/OBC students in 2017. Why do public universities withdraw aid from the marginalised groups?

Withdrawal of financial assistance forces us to understand higher education spaces in relation to exclusionary practices towards the marginalized. Thirumal, 2020 states that higher education spaces are suggestive of caste supremacy and reproduce hostile structures on a day-to-day basis. The affirmative actions only deal with physical accessibility and not everyday experiences of the marginalized groups. The normalized caste brutality in higher education spaces can be understood not only through the physical entry to universities but also through, yet not limited to, the existence and acknowledgement of Dalit identities, their experiences inside and outside classrooms and university campuses, and also through understanding who possesses the actual(concrete existence) and virtual (reflective) dimensions in universities (Thirumal, 2020).

For many students accessing higher education is directly beneficial to climb the social ladder. However, the dilemmas of Dalit students do not end at the entry of universities. With the scrapping of a full waiver of fees, even the entry to universities becomes a challenge for Dalit students. Where affirmative actions are already not complete solutions to grave problems of discrimination, removing even them gives birth to more contestations in the already problematic situation. The public higher education spaces become elite-caste supreme places which exclude the marginalized groups actively as well as passively.

The scenario becomes darker when intersectionality is looked at. The dilution of a full fee waiver might adversely affect Dalit women, Dalits with disabilities, and Dalits who belong to the LGBTIQ community. The situation for people belonging to these communities is already problematic. Reaching higher education spaces is already difficult for them. There are very fewer studies on Dalits belonging to LGBTIQ or those who have a disability but many studies and surveys such as that of All India Survey on Higher Education 2018-19 (AISHE) suggest that there is under-representation of Dalit women and a high drop out rate in higher education spaces. 

The income slab criteria do not question the dropout rates and low enrolment rates of the marginalized groups. It does not question why educational gates are closed for many people belonging to the marginalized groups. The income slab criteria also do not acknowledge the existence of different bodies of the marginalized communities. The income criteria is not justified for the marginalized groups because they are not discriminated solely because of income. The problems they face are social in nature and by using income as criteria, the root cause of discriminations faced by them gets misrepresented. 

In conclusion, by creating inaccessibility at the entry-level, higher education becomes undemocratic and exclusionary in its functioning. By implementing the income slab provision, the public universities acknowledge the existence of only economic disparities in the country and silence the voices coming from the marginalized communities. Caste is not solely an economic issue and removing the full fee waiver provision only sidelines them. The issue must be seen in the context of intersectionality by understanding the struggles of Dalits coming from different communities. There is a need to question the public universities which are moving towards creating hostile environments for the marginalized groups. Where researches should focus on experiences, ideas, aspirations and social mobility of Dalits, we have moved back to square one where the question of accessibility becomes prominent. It is very problematic that even after 73 years of independence, we are still challenged by the questions of accessibility.  

Reference

Thirumal, P. (2020, January 18). Dominant Bodies and Their Ethical Performances: Violence of Caste Embodiment in Higher Educational Institutions. Economic & Political Weekly, LV, 36-40.

Disha Sharma is pursuing PhD in Education from Ambedkar University Delhi and can be reached out at dishasharma2510.ds@gmail.com