Quota Raj and Indian Railways

It is strange that people get most brilliant of ideas in strangest of places and then having got the idea people do strangest of things lest the idea should slip off their mind just like it came. A gentleman, it is said, hence ran on streets of Greece naked so that the brilliant idea he got in his bathtub should not skip him; to the best of my knowledge he shouted ‘Eureka’.
I too got an idea while standing in queue and simultaneously getting frustrated by the length of the queue to get my ticket to Ahemadabad. The idea must not have been as great as the abovementioned person got, because I did not feel the urge to strip down and leave my queue to run on streets of Delhi, or possibly the idea of starting from the last point of queue all over again, which was some two kilometres away from where I was standing, must have preserved my sanity.
The idea is very simple but needs some background. Government, having shown its incompetence to improve socially and economically backward classes has gone for a quick and dirty solution to the problem by means of reserving 50% quota for SC/ST/OBC. If government has not been able to elevate the social status of backward classes and emancipate them from the clutches of poverty then it is utter failure of not only the education system but also of complete administration. Educationist and bureaucrats should practice what they preach. There are places in India where primary school teachers do not accept water or food from the so-called shudra. Same is the case with bureaucrats and police of those areas where Harijans are treated with complete disrespect. However, since the government is incapable of handling its own machinery they set up quotas to hide their ineptitude. But here again, the people who really deserve the benefits of quota get neglected and those sections of backward classes who are rich and influential get further boost.
Mr. Arjun Singh’s role after becoming HRD minister has been to use government services to improve his health and to get votes for Madam. In the process, he has completely forgotten the role which an HRD minister should play i.e. of improving human resources capabilities in a resource-rich country like India. Many youngsters go to countries such as USA, Australia and UK because our HRD ministry has completely neglected importance of encouraging researches at post graduate level, there is just one institute in India which is dedicated to researches of pure sciences. After completing the schooling and graduation many students leave for abroad simply because there aren’t enough number of seats and out of those which are available, ministry ensures that those too are not filled by deserving candidates but by those who have reservations for them in the name of backward classes.
And the best part remains how the ministry offsets the number of seats which are reserved for quota, it does so by increasing the number of seats. So, they are leaving no stone unturned to bring down the quality of education in India. First, they admit non-deserving students and then they also ensure that the existing standards also come down by straining the teachers to the last degree by increasing the number of students.
Now let us come to the idea which I got while standing in the queue, since we have imposed the quota on education then why not have a quota in the railways as well? Say 50% of the seats reserved for backward classes because upper classes can always resort to other means such as airplanes and cars. Better still; why not reserve the 50% of booking counters as well for the backward classes, just for social uplift!