We want LI to be one of the friendliest places on the internet, where lawyers and law students help each other with their career related queries and occasionally discuss other stuff that might affect their lives too. In other words:
1. Be kind, respectful and helpful to each other.
2. Be bona fide, truthful, genuine and curious.
3. Assume the best intention of others.
Therefore, in using the site, you must agree to do your best to uphold these community guidelines.
Note that what you find here is written and moderated by anonymous people on the internet.
Therefore everything you read here is very likely unverified, rumour, speculation and/or downright false.
In continuing to read anything here, you must therefore agree not to take anything you read here as factual and that you will exercise due caution, diligence and common sense before acting on any information you may come across here.
You also agree to report any inaccurate or malicious comments with the buttons. Moderators take action within 24 hours, as required and appropriate under law.
Our full terms and conditions apply too.
Do you solemnly agree to all of the above?
"If there were no reservations for untouchables, I would not have been admitted to the National Law School, Bangalore, and would not have become a lawyer. "
"When we worked together in 2004, one of the first things you did at the start of the Gujarat National Law University project was to organise a Hindu ritual presided over by Brahmin priests. Can you imagine a casteless society in which a new university project begins with a Hindu ritual presided over by untouchables? Will Brahmins voluntarily give up their exclusive entitlement to carry out Hindu religious ceremonies?"
"When I was looking to get married, between April 2004 and June 2006, I contacted several women on matrimonial websites, including some from the privileged castes. The names of the elite educational institutions on my resume – Columbia Law School, New York and National Law School, India – attracted many of them. But then they would ask me about my caste identity. The moment I revealed I was an untouchable, they were not interested in me anymore. Do you think those women and their families will stop poking and probing prospective spouses about caste when you take away the reservations for untouchables? (Note: my wife is a lovely woman born to parents of privileged castes who recognised my worth beyond my caste identity.)"
"Your brother judge Justice Pardiwala has stated that BR Ambedkar, the chairman of the drafting committee of the Indian Constitution, wanted reservations to end within 10 years of their commencement. He does not cite any source for his assertion. In fact, as my fellow untouchable brother Anurag Bhaskar demonstrated in this note, this is patently false."
https://scroll.in/article/1037604/why-reservations-matter-a-letter-to-justice-trivedi-from-an-untouchable-ex-colleague
Regarding matrimonial sites, the user base is socially conservative and they are bound to stick with people of their own community. Would Muslim women on Shaadi.com have accepted him? Even a Sunni Muslim woman won't accept a Shia man on such websites. Does it make those women communal? Of course not.
Regarding a Hindu ritual at GNLU, it is ludicrous and mischievous to read casteism into it. Every Bollywood production has a ritual where a coconut is broken. Actors of all faiths and castes do so. Regarding Brahmin priests, I'm sure Justice Trivedi didn't handpick priests! She probably asked some assistant to arrange it and that guy must have called up a local agency or contact.
2nd para: 'trans-formative constitutionalism' is a tool for constitutional interpretation. According to it, you do not take the most base view prevalent in the society and act according to it. You take into consideration the the constitutional ideals. Matrimonial advertisements should not carry casteist or communal preferences upfront. These advertisements are for the public and reasonable restriction are important.
3rd para: assuming he does not support any idea that only a priest born into a certain caste can perform holy functions, it was a public event and she should have stopped it. The public space are not reserved for casteism.
And I am assuming that you agree that she is incorrect on "facts" about Dr Ambedkar's statement and her proposition that reservations should end (you want them for all communities, right?) is baseless.
With regard to Trivedi's decision, the problem is that the EWS also leaves out poor reserved category students! Based on your own argument, if the reserved seats get taken by the rich SC/ST/OBC students (which actually does not always happen in reality as per any scientific study actually conducted), and the poor Savarna people take up the EWS seats, then what happens to the poor Dalits? If it is only based on economic criterion, then it makes no sense to exclude anyone who qualifies on the basis of that criterion. Or else don't call it EWS, but poor Savarna reservation.