MUMBAI: Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat on Thursday said caste-based reservation would remain necessary as long as social discrimination and inequality persisted, but urged beneficiaries who had achieved social and economic advancement to consider voluntarily relinquishing the benefits.
Bhagwat made the remarks during an interaction with IIMUN founder Rishabh Shah at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre in Mumbai. Around 2,000 members of Gen Z and Gen Alpha attended the programme, where Shah posed questions sourced from young people, including school students.
Responding to whether reservation in education and employment should be curtailed, Bhagwat said the issue should be viewed through the principles articulated by Dr B.R. Ambedkar.
“I will not answer directly. I will ask you to examine what Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar thought about reservation. If we honestly follow his advice, there will be no problem,” Bhagwat said.
“Reservation exists because of social reasons. As long as social discrimination exists, reservation will continue,” he added.
The RSS chief said those who had benefited from reservation and improved their circumstances should show generosity by allowing disadvantaged members of their communities to receive similar opportunities.
“Those who have received reservation benefits and whose situation has improved should have the generosity to give them up,” he said, adding that such thinking was already emerging among some beneficiaries.
Bhagwat also supported the idea that reservation benefits should reach all deprived sections within eligible communities. He said demands for sub-categorisation had arisen from concerns that the benefits were not being distributed evenly.
“There is a stream of thought among beneficiaries that reservation is meant for upliftment. We must use it to improve ourselves and make it available to those who have not yet received its benefits,” he said.
He stressed that reservation should be implemented honestly and kept above political considerations. Sincere welfare measures, he said, could help reduce inequality and eventually lessen the need for quotas.
Bhagwat criticised the politicisation of reservation, saying the policy was introduced to promote social unity but had often been used to create divisions.
“In reality, it was introduced as a measure for social unity. The measure itself is not wrong, but it is being handled in the wrong manner. Unless that is corrected, little will change,” he said.
His remarks came amid renewed protests and public debate over caste-based reservation, with demonstrators in several states demanding reforms such as periodic reviews, income-based criteria and sub-categorisation of quota benefits.
