|
The Rajinder Sachar Committee notes that the Muslim community exhibits “deficits and deprivation” in practically all dimensions of development.
The Rajinder Sachar Committee, appointed by the Prime Minister to evaluate the social, economic and educational status of Muslims, has suggested the adoption of suitable mechanisms to ensure equity and equality of opportunity to Muslims in residential, work and educational spaces. The first of its kind report, tabled in the Parliament makes a strong pitch for making diversity a key feature of public policy.
The report emphasises that these objectives can be achieved only “when the importance of Muslims as an intrinsic part of the diverse Indian social mosaic is squarely recognised.” It recommends the creation of an Equal Opportunity Commission, modelled on the U.K. Race Relations Act, 1976, to look into the grievances of religious minorities.
“It is imperative that if the minorities have certain perceptions of being aggrieved, all efforts should be made by the state to find a mechanism by which these complaints could be attended to expeditiously.” Other institutional mechanisms suggested include a national bank to collect and store data, and an autonomous authority to assess, monitor and suggest timely policy options.
The report notes that the community exhibits “deficits and deprivation” in practically all dimensions of development. “In fact, by and large, Muslims rank somewhat above the SCs/STs, but below Hindu OBCs, Other Minorities and Hindu General (mostly upper castes) in almost all indicators considered.” In States with large Muslim population, “the situation is particularly grave in... West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Assam.” What adds to the “development deficit,” is the perception among Muslims that they are discriminated against and excluded.
The report demolishes several myths about the community. Its findings: only four per cent of all Muslim students are enrolled in madrasas and Muslim parents are not averse to modern or mainstream education, and would, in fact, prefer to send their children to “regular school education that is open to any other child in India .” In social indices such as infant mortality rate and sex ratio, the community fares better than the rest of the population.
The report suggests specific policy initiatives to address educational, career and political deprivation among Muslims. On education, its recommendations include a special focus on free and compulsory education; institutionalising the process of evaluating school textbooks so that they better reflect community-specific sensitivities; setting up quality government schools, especially for girls, in areas of Muslim concentration; and providing primary education in Urdu in areas where the language is widely in use.
When it comes to employment and economic opportunities, Muslims face many problems like lower earnings, inferior jobs, insecurity and fewer credit options, according to the Sachar Committee report.
Muslim workers are paid less than their counterparts from other communities owing to the nature and skill of the work they do, it said. “While Muslim men and women have lower daily earnings than Hindus in the public sector, the difference in earnings between Hindus and Muslims is much larger than the private sector,” said the report recently tabled in Parliament.
“Muslim regular workers get lower daily earnings (salary) both in public and private jobs compared to other socio-religious categories.A large part of the difference is likely to be due to the nature of the private sector enterprises themselves, with the Muslims being engaged in smaller and informal jobs and thereby low productivity enterprises, it said.
Terming professionals in the community to be “vulnerable”, the report pointed out that Muslims have a lower representation in the managerial cadre. It said, “Available data clearly shows that on an average, Muslim regular workers are the most vulnerable with no written contract and social security and benefits.”
The participation of Muslim workers in production-related activities and transport equipment operation is much higher than in other communities. “About 34 per cent of Muslims workers are engaged in such occupations, as against 21 per cent for all workers and about 19 per cent for Hindu workers. Importantly, this pattern prevails for both male and female workers and in rural and urban areas,” it said.
The report said the Committee had found “low participation” of Muslims in salaried jobs and a “relatively higher share” engaged in self-employment activities. The participation of Muslims in security and defence- related professions (like police forces) is considerably lower than their share in population.
“Muslims’ share in defence sector was found to be only four per cent while for Hindu-SCs, it is 12 per cent and for Hindu-OBCs it is 23 per cent and for upper caste Hindus, it is as high as 52 per cent,” it said. The report suggested more credit flow and skill development initiatives for Muslims as one of the measures to help improve the situation.
“Since a large section of Muslim workers are engaged in self-employment, skill develo-pment and credit related initiatives need to be tailored for such groups,” it added.
Noting that Muslim participation in electoral bodies is known to be small, the report said, of the 543 Lok Sabha members, only 33 are Muslims. The panel said a carefully conceived ‘nomination proce-dure’ can be worked out to increase the participation of minorities at grassroots and electoral bodies.
Given the power of numbers in a democratic polity, based on universal franchise, minorities in India lack effective agency and political importance,” the 404-page report said. The Committee has recommended elimination of anomalies with respect to reserved constituencies under the delimitation schemes.
“A more rational delimitation procedure that does not reserve constituencies with high minority population shares for SCs will improve the opportunity for minorities, especially Muslims, to contest and get elected to Parliament and state Assemblies,”says the report.
The Committee also recommended mechanisms where madrasas can be linked with a higher secondary school board so that students wanting to shift to a regular/mainstream education can do so after having passed from a madrasa.
It also recommended recognition of degrees from madrasas for eligibility in competitive examinations such as civil services, banks, defence services and other such examinations.
The private colleges including those run by minorities having university affiliation can be provided additional funds if they have a diverse student population and charge reasonable fee. The Sachar Report has blown a very big hole into the time-tested right-wing Hindu propaganda that the Congress has always indulged in “Muslim appeasement”;
Following are the recommendations of the Rajinder Sachar Committee report on the social, economic and educational status of the Muslim community in the country tabled in Parliament
* Working out nomination procedure to increase participation of minorities in public bodies.
* Providing legal mechanism to address complaints of discrimination against minorities in matters of employment, housing, schooling and obtaining bank loans.
* Initiating and institution-alising a process of evaluating contents of textbooks to purge them of explicit and implicit material that may impart inappropriate social values, especially religious intolerance.
* Setting up an autonomous assessment and monitoring authority to evaluate the extent of development benefits which accrue to different socio-religious categories through various programmes.
* Encouraging the University Grants Commission to evolve a system where part of allocation to colleges and universities is linked to diversity in student population.
* Facilitating admissions to the most backward amongst all socio-religious categories in regular universities and autonomous colleges and evolving alternate admission criteria
* Providing financial and other support to initiatives built around occupations where Muslims are concentrated and that have growth potential.
* Increasing employment share of Muslims, particularly where there is great deal of public dealing.
* Working out mechanisms to link madrasas with higher secondary school board.
* Recognising degrees from madrasas for eligibility in defence, civil and banking examinations.
* Providing hostel facilities at reasonable costs for students from minorities on a priority basis.
* Promoting and enhancing access to Muslims in priority sector advances.
* Including teacher training components that introduce importance of diversity and plurality and sensitising teachers towards needs and aspirations of Muslims and other marginalised communities.
* Opening high quality Urdu medium schools wherever they are in demand and ensuring high quality textbooks for students in the Urdu language.
|
|
