The Poster boy of Savarna Agitation

With the brazen self-immolation act of Rajeev Goswami, the false notion of merit in the Indian society got deeply entrenched in the minds of upper-caste Indians, especially the educated student population. This plagued mentality still continues to this date after exactly thirty-one years of the event.

A picture of Rajeev Goswami during the Mandal Commission protests in 1990; Image Source: Indian Express

Caste/Varna/Jati has been a divisive issue along which many lines of thoughts and politics have crisscrossed each other. There was a huge ideological rift between Gandhi and Ambedkar on the issue of a separate electorate of castes in pre-independence Indian politics. Even after gaining independence, the Nehru government prevented the release of the caste census which to this date remains hidden from the public domain.

In 1979, the Indian government under Morarji Desai appointed Bindeshwari Prasad Mandal to form the Second Backward Class Commission. It took two years for the Mandal Commission to draft a report during which the government of Morarji Desai was replaced by that of Indira Gandhi's. This invaluable report then remained as a mere piece of paperwork during the reign of both Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. All the while, Bahujan communities were swiftly excluded from the mosaic of Indian society.

Finally, when V.P. Singh became the prime minister of India, the parliament announced that it would accept and implement the Mandal Commission on the 7th of August, 1990. The Report of the Mandal Commission recommended a 27% reservation of jobs in central services and public undertakings for the "socially and educationally backward classes" of India. As soon as this was announced, protests sparked off from the national capital which later encompasses the majority of Indian states. The southern states remained largely aloof from this agitation. The protestors took to the streets to preserve the merit and deny "quota politics".

Rajeev Goswami was one such overzealous protestor who felt strongly against the Mandal Commission Report. He was then a 19-year-old student studying at Deshbandhu College, Delhi University. He self-immolated himself in agitation against the Mandal Commission recommendations much like the monks during Vietnam War. He survived after suffering from 50% burns and finally died in 2004 after going through various health complications as a result of the burns.

Although Rajeev Goswami survived, his public stunt only provided a vessel for casteist movements in the future which witnessed numerous atrocities to individuals belonging to Bahujan backgrounds.

Rajeev Goswami's daughter Simran Goswami is currently living in Michigan and she subscribes heavily to her father's controversial views. In her words, she is "away from India's divisive politics". She believes that her father brought about a change in the tides of Indian politics by protesting against a very progressive measure that was formulated by the government to enact proper justice to the communities that were ostracised from Indian society from time immemorial. She believes that her new home, the United States has no reservations when she says "In the US, only merit is recognised". This is obviously a very ignorant and privileged thing to say because she overlooks the entire history of slavery and the enactment of affirmative action in the United States.

This is how the legacy of Rajeev Goswami lives on, in the mouths and slogans of ignorant and privileged individuals and students who believe that India is a perfect society where generational caste benefits and wealth is but an invisible cloak as seen in Harry Potter. These individuals, even after hailing from such educated backgrounds, do not realise that throughout history whenever there has been a persecuted community there has been affirmative actions that were implemented by the state to fast track the social progress of those marginalised communities. This has been a successful reality in Apartheid Africa and slavery ridden America but not in India due to acute Savarna hegemony in all sectors of public life.

Thus, as Rajeev Goswami burned on the 19th of September so did the consciousness of affirmative action within us. To this date some staunch students are advocates for anti-reservation within the education fold, there are employers who undermine the merit of employees who got in through reservations, similar OBC students are bullied within the universities. What happened to Rajeev Goswami was not at all good but rather than painting him as an idol, as is done by many mainstream news outlets, we should critique his understandings so that we can make affirmative action a reality in this country.