Reservation & Competition
"Reservation helps upper caste people" is a counter-intuitive statement. But this could be true. Here is an explanation. First an anecdote: The last two organizations I worked in had an identical problem regarding lateral hires for senior roles - like Architects, Program Managers, etc. The roles demanded domain/technology-specific skills, communication/writing skills, interpersonal skills, a good understanding of customers' business, etc. Too many people came and none survived for more than a few months. After years of frustrating search, it dawned upon me that those who survived the grind in the organization had something in common - they all had competed in some all-India level exams - like JEE, CAT, or equivalent. They didn't necessarily go to an IIT or IIM. It is the effort put in to compete in an all-India level exam in open-category that made the difference. And those who failed did not face such exams earlier in their lives b...