Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi said the Congress party would consider abolishing reservations when India becomes a fair country, but that is not the case at the moment.
Gandhi made these remarks while addressing students at the prestigious Georgetown University.
“We will think about abolishing reservations when India becomes a fair country. And India is not a fair country,” Gandhi told students at a local college, replying to a question on reservations and how long they would last.
“If you look at the financial figures, indigenous people get 10 paisa out of 100 rupees, Dalits get 5 rupees out of 100 rupees and OBCs get a similar amount. The fact is, they are not getting any participation,” Gandhi said.
“The problem is 90 per cent of Indians can’t play. Look at a list of all the business leaders in India. I’ve done it. Show me a tribal name. Show me a Dalit name. Show me an OBC name. I think out of the top 200, there’s one OBC. They make up 50 per cent of India. But we’re not treating the symptoms,” he said.
“That’s the problem. Now reservations are not the only tool. There are other tools,” he said.
“A lot of people from upper castes are saying, what have we done wrong, why are we being punished? So think about dramatically increasing the supply of these things. Think about decentralizing power. Think about getting more people involved in running the country. Think about opening up. With all due respect, I don’t think any of you have an Adani or an Ambani. And there’s a reason for that. You can’t. Because the doors are closed. So the answer to the general caste people is to open the doors,” Gandhi said.
Asked about the Uniform Civil Code, Gandhi said he would comment only after knowing what the BJP’s proposal was.
“The BJP has proposed a Uniform Civil Code. We are yet to see it. We have no idea what they are saying. There is no point in us commenting on it. Once they announce it, we will see it and comment,” he said.
Gandhi also said that although members of the Indian Union have differences of opinion, they agree on many points.
“We agree that the Indian Constitution should be upheld. Most of us agree with the idea of caste census. We agree that two businessmen, Adani and Ambani, should not be running all of India’s businesses. So I think it’s inaccurate to say we don’t agree,” he said.
“Secondly, in every coalition government, there is always some degree of back and forth. That’s completely natural. There’s nothing wrong with that. We’ve run successful governments many times using coalitions, so we’re pretty confident we can do it again,” he said.
