For India Inc, it's reservation vs self-preservation

MUMBAI: ''Brand'' is a word that neo-liberalised, corporate India loves. But the branding that has been going on over the last few weeks has nothing to do with Gucci or Dior—it''s an etymological throwback to an era where branding was a mark of inferiority imposed on an entire people.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh''s statement a few days ago asking the private sector to institute voluntary reservations for the backward classes has started the ''branding'' exercise afresh.
Industry associations and corporate honchos, alarmed at the suggestion, reacted strongly, declaring that the policy of reservation was "anti-merit" and would compromise the competitive edge of India Inc.
The implication here—that Dalits lack merit —has set off a renewed war of words between the opposing camps.
For 55 years, the issue of reservations in state-run educational and employment institutions has been a contentious and emotive one.
The fact that reservations have more often than not sprung from political expediency rather than a desire to empower the underprivileged, as also the fact that they have been perceived as disproportionate, has led to the word ''reservation'' being one of the most cussed in the Indian vocabulary.
However, votaries of affirmative action also ask the following questions. Is the Pavlovian response, Dalit = Demerit, based on statistics or bias?
Can the private sector, which for decades fattened itself on government protectionism, afford to rubbish another kind of protectionism? Will reservations for Dalits really cripple it?