In a refreshing twist to the Reservation debate, the Government issued a note specifying that children of Government functionaries, judiciary, media, tax paying citizens, and employees of bank, insurance, and universities will be considered to be “Creamy Layer.”
In addition, the note said that children of doctors, lawyers, chartered accountants, income tax consultants, financial or management consultants, dental surgeons, engineers, architects, computer specialists, film artists and other film professionals, authors, playwrights, sportspersons, sports and media professionals or any other vocations of like status will also be considered “Creamy Layer.”
The note is very significant because of growing Government acceptance that most
of the benefits of Reservation is not going to the poor but being aggrandized by
the “Creamy Layer.” What would be good is to include the children of politicians
and the same rules applied to the Scheduled Class and Scheduled Tribe
population. However, the biggest issue in India is lack of enforcement and the
ability to claim an alternate profession without any criminal or legal
consequence.
Any law that deals with defining the “Creamy Layer” must allow for strong legal
and criminal consequence for willfully claiming the wrong status.
