Of the little joys from life

For the last few months I have been up all night. I've been pretty engrossed in making full use of every possible communication technology available to me (read Yahoo messenger and Orkut). I have been chatting with my friends back home and in other places. Nothing that sounds out of the world there, you may say. But these are people I have known for periods as short as a month.
It is an amazing experience to gel so well with people who you've never even seen. Sharing jokes, pulling each others legs, or simply talking your heart out. The cornerstones of friendship. How did it happen? After 12 years of schooling and 3 years of college, and I had a handful of people who I could still call at any time of the day or night, just to say hi. But suddenly, I am up all night pouring my fears and joys into those multiple messenger windows, to people I've met just a couple of times. What is it that connects me to them?
I have seen the same kind of sentiment echoed at PG meets around the country. Groups of level-headed mature people congregate and feel a bonding that's closer than years of sitting side by side through math class and eating out of one lunch box (okay, that's a bollywood line) But what is it that makes these people feel closer than ever to complete strangers, known by nothing but a virtual image they have chosen to create?
Initially, my thought was that a common underlying thread connecting everyone, was that elusive feline, CAT. But no, its not that. There's a sentiment stronger than just an exam (oh, alright, CAT isn't just another exam!). There was the element of being able to think on a common plane,of intellect, interests, joys, fears. But there was something more also. This is no ordinary friendship, a passing infactuation, in a manner of speaking.
I find it hard to explain what draws me to these people, why I want to spend time just joking around and debating on the silliest of issues with them. But all I can say is that this is one group of people I will not want to lose. Friendship is sometimes like wine, it gets better as it grows older. For all those wonderful frienships out there......Cheers!!

More reservations!!

The reservation debate seems to be progressing with vigour even though the government forced the YFE forum to back down at AIIMS. Today Ms. Meira Kumar took the issue one step further with increasing the reservation for SC’s now!! This is in addition to the pledge the UPA government has taken to introduce the same in respect of jobs in the private sector. It is a wonder how far the government will with so called upliftment policy of theirs.

Years ago, when the Indian Constitution was being drafted, the Constituent Assembly debated this issue. They felt it was imperative to take some step to bring the weaker sections of society to the fore after so many centuries of discrimination. Very noble of them and very prudent. At that juncture, certain senior and highly respected political figures, viz. Mahatma Gandhi, Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru and Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, proposed introducing quotas in certain fields for these communities.

Just a few years later, in a letter to his cabinet, Pt. Nehru admitted that quotas were not the solution to the problem they wanted to eliminate. He admitted the blunder they had committed when they drafted the Constitution.

Over six decades later we are talking of extending the quota system to the private sector. The world has changed a lot in the last few decades but unfortunately the very honourable octogenarians in New Delhi seem to be oblivious to this. Today, the world runs on purchasing power and the ability to stand one’s ground in the midst of the mad scramble for more greenbacks. It is a world where bills of currency decide who is entitled to what. Gone are the days when admission to a club or restaurant or a train coach was based on the colour of one’s skin or caste or religion. You can have whatever you want if you can pay for it. Unfortunately, this also applies to education, that vast ocean of knowledge which grows the more people it is given to. Ask the parents of a 4 year old in any urban city how much they have shell out to ensure their tiny tot can access a decent education. This same logic passes all through the education chain right up to the post graduate education level.

Then why, is it that the government wants to reserve seats only at the end of the chain? If the noble logic behind the gesture of quotas is to ensure access to education for the downtrodden, then pray, why don’t you do the same at the primary level? After all, isn’t a 4 year from a backward caste also entitled to education…or do they become ‘eligible’, by some weird train of thought, only when they come of age?