Scheduled castes policies in interstate perspective: Constitutional power, argumentative practices, and governance in India

India Review

Volumn 13, Issue 3, 2014, Pages 235-250

  Berg, Dag Erik ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF BERGEN   (Norway)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84906058486     PISSN: 14736489     EISSN: 15573036     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/14736489.2014.937269     Document Type: Article

References (58)

1. Atul Kohli, Poverty Amid Plenty in the New India (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).
2. Dag Erik Berg, Towards a Framework for Interstate Analysis of Policies for the Scheduled Castes in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu: Legal Conditions and Development Policies (London: School of Oriental and African Studies, 2012). Accessible via http://casteout.wordpress.com/. The Principal Investigator for the Caste of Development project was Professor of Anthropology David Mosse.
3. One example here is Sukhadeo Thorat, Dalits in India. Search for a Common Destiny (New Delhi: Sage, 2009).
4. Bevir, Mark. A Theory of Governance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013).
5. Granville Austin, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999).
6. See Yagati Chinna Rao, ed., Dividing Dalits: Anthology on Sub-Categorisation of Scheduled Castes (Jaipur: Rawat Publications, 2009).
7. Charles C. Ragin, The Comparative Method: Moving Beyond Qualitative and Quantitative Strategies (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987).
8. By using term "argumentative practice, " I largely follow Bevir's theory of governance, although I also use the concept of "contention" that is normally associated with Tarrow's writings on social movements. Mark Bevir, A Theory of Governance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013).
9. Sidney Tarrow, Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). I acknowledge that there are conceptual differences between these positions.
10. The aim in this paper is not to spell out the conceptual details concerning the comparative method as such, as I focus on essential characteristics and formal conditions for comparing policies across states.
11. Francine R. Frankel and M. S. A. Rao, Dominance and State Power in Modern India: Decline of a Social Order (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1989).
12. Rob Jenkins, Regional Reflections: Comparing Politics across India's States (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 4.
13. See also John Harriss, "Comparing Political Regimes across Indian States: A Preliminary Essay, " Economic and Political Weekly Vol. 34, No. 48 (1999).
14. See Loraine Kennedy, "The Political Determinants of Reform Packaging. Contrasting Responses to Economic Liberalization in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, " in Regional Reflections. Comparing Politics across India's States ed. Rob Jenkins (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004). Methodologically, her research is mainly based on government policy documents and newspaper articles. The argument and exposition does not reflect ethnographic data and observations, but this is the most organized comparison of the two states that I know about.
15. James Manor, "Explaining Political Trajectories in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, " in Rob Jenkins, ed., Regional Reflections. Comparing Politics across India's States (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004).
16. The Sachar commission report on the situation for the Muslims in India involved many requests to the Ministry for statistics, Rajinadar (Chairman) Sachar, "Social, Economic and Educational Status of the Muslim Community in India. Prime Minister's High Level Committee, " ed. Government of India Cabinet Secretariat (New Delhi, 2006). Although this was an official commission where one should not expect problems in accessing statistical data, it seems to have involved an extra work on behalf of the government to produce the relevant statistics.
17. Prominent examples in the literature include C. J. Fuller and Véronique Bénéi, eds., The Everyday State and Society in Modern India (London: Hurst & Company, 2001).
18. Akhil Gupta, Red Tape: Bureaucracy, Structural Violence, and Poverty in India (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2012).
19. "Andhra Pradesh Assembly Creates History, " The Hindu, December 3, 2012.
20. Mallepalli Laxmaiah, "Law on Sc/St Sub-Plan, " The Hans India, March 29, 2012.
21. "Follow A.P. Model of Sc, St Sub-Plan Act, " The Hindu, August 29, 2013.
22. This happened, for instance, at the meeting in Bangalore August 28, 2013 with activists from Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. Here, the founder-president of the Center for Dalit Studies in Hyderabad, Mallepalli Laxmaiah and the current director M. Anjaneyulu explained how the AP model could be used in other states.
23. See, for instance, David Howarth, "Power, Discourse, and Policy: Articulating a Hegemony Approach to Critical Policy Studies, " Critical Policy Studies Vol. 3, Nos. 3-4 (2010), p. 310.
24. Galanter, Competing Equalities: Law and the Backward Classes in India, p. 130.
25. Granville Austin, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 63-64.
26. Galanter, Competing Equalities: Law and the Backward Classes in India, p. 134.
27. Government of Andhra Pradesh, The Andhra Pradesh Scheduled Castes (Rationalization of Reservations)-Rules 2000 (Andhra Pradesh: Social Welfare Department, 2000). Accessible via http://www.aponline.gov.in.
28. See also Notification of Government of Andhra Pradesh Rationalisation (Sub-Category) Act of Reservation Rules (Andhra Pradesh: Published as Appendix 8 in Y. C. Rao, ed., Dividing Dalits (2009), pp. 308-11, 2000).
29. E.V. Chinnaiah, "E.V. Chinnaiah V. State of Andhra Pradesh and Ors. " Accessible via http://www.judis. openarchive.in/2004.
30. Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph, "The Old and the New Federalism in Independent India, " in Paul R. Brass, ed., Routledge Handbook of South Asian Politics (Oxon: Routledge, 2010), p. 148.
31. Lawrence Sáez, Federalism without a Centre. The Impact of Political and Economic Reform in India's Federal System (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2002).
32. Lawrence Sáez, Federalism without a Centre. The Impact of Political and Economic Reform in India's Federal System (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2002), p. 35.
33. See discussion in Rob Jenkins, "International Development Institutions and National Âeconomic Contexts: Neo-Liberalism Encounters India's Indigenous Political Traditions, " Economy and Society Vol. 32, No. 4 (2003).
34. For useful background studies on federalism in India, see Sáez, Federalism without a Centre. The Impact of Political and Economic Reform in India's Federal System.
35. Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph, "Federalism as State Formation in India: A Theory of Shared and Negotiated Sovereignty, " International Political Science Review Vol. 31, No. 5 (2010).
36. Subrata Kumar Mitra, Politics in India: Structure, Process and Policy, (London: Routledge, 2011).
37. Katharine Adeney, Federalism and Ethnic Conflict Regulation in India and Pakistan (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007). There are different and overlapping terminologies in these important studies. For example, Mitra emphasizes the "flexibility" in the federal system, whereas the Rudolphs have stressed how federalism is essentially a matter of ongoing negotiations.
38. Rob Jenkins, "How Federalism Influences India's Domestic Politics of Wto Engagement (and Is Itself Affected in the Process), " Asian Survey Vol. 43, No. 4 (2003), p. 611.
39. The concept of creamy layer is a central topic that illustrates the differences between the categories, SC, SC, and OBC. While the concept does not legally apply to the SCs and STs, it is used in the context of OBCs. See Dag Erik Berg, "Dalits and the Constitutional State. Untouchability, Dalit Movements and Legal Approaches to Equality and Social Justice for India's Scheduled Castes" (PhD thesis, University of Bergen, 2011), chapter 9.
40. Austin, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation, p. 76.
41. For a comprehensive discussion of the judgement's (Kesavananda) significance in India's constitutional history, see Sudhir Krishnaswamy, Democracy and Constitutionalism in India: A Study of the Basic Structure Doctrine (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2009).
42. P. S. Krishnan, Empowering Dalits for Empowering India. A Road-Map (New Delhi: Manak Publications, 2009), p. 84.
43. Government of India, Planning Commission, Social Justice. Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, Minorities, and Other Vulnerable Groups. Accessible via http://planningcommission.nic. in/.
44. Government of India, Planning Commission, Social Justice. Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, Minorities, and Other Vulnerable Groups. Accessible via http://planningcommission.nic. in/, p. 104.
45. S. N. Dubey and Usha Mathur, "Welfare Programmes for Scheduled Castes: Content and Administration, " Economic and Political Weekly Vol. 7, No. 4 (1972), p. 172.
46. This is an assumption emerging from fieldwork of David Mosse and his research team. David Mosse in personal communication, London, March 2012.
47. This could possibly be seen in the context of a larger reorganization of ministries or commissionaries for minorities and special offices at the time of the Janata Party, see discussion in Granville Austin, Working a Democratic Constitution. A History of the Indian Experience, Second impression. First published 1999. ed. (New Dehli: Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 450-51.
48. Government of India, National Commission for Scheduled Castes, Genesis. Accessible via http://ncsc.nic.in/.
49. Niraja Gopal Jayal, Representing India. Ethnic Diversity and the Governance of Public Institutions (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), p. 76ff.
50. Niraja Gopal Jayal, Representing India. Ethnic Diversity and the Governance of Public Institutions (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), p. 79.
51. Niraja Gopal Jayal, Representing India. Ethnic Diversity and the Governance of Public Institutions (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), p. 81. Jayal's book was published in 2006, some years after these reports were published. The sixth report dealt with the period 2001-02, although I am not sure when they have been published, nor if they have ever been presented to the Parliament.
52. "About Us-Brief History, " Government of India, Ministry of Social Welfare and Empowerment. Accessible via http://socialjustice.nic.in/.
53. P. S. Krishnan, Empowering Dalits for Empowering India. A Road-Map (New Delhi: Manak Publications, 2009), p. 55.
54. Government of India, Ministry of Social Welfare and Empowerment, Scheduled Caste Welfare-About the Division. Accessible via http://socialjustice.nic.in/.
55. "List of address of state Scheduled Castes Development Corporation, " Government of India, Scheduled Caste Welfare. Accessible via http://socialjustice.nic.in/addressscdc.php.
56. Government of India, Ministry of Social Welfare and Empowerment Scheduled Caste Welfare Department, Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) [about SCDC]. Accessible via http://socialjustice.nic.in/faqscdc.php.
57. "Bihar State Scheduled Castes Co-Operative Development Corporation Ltd. "
58. Mark Bevir, A Theory of Governance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013).