The 'Compensatory Discrimination' Theme in the Indian Commitment to Human Rights', India International Centre Quarterly 13:(No. 384):77-94 (1986)
Abstract
INDIA embraced equality as a cardinal value against a background of elaborate, valued and clearly perceived inequalities. Her constitutional policies to offset these proceeded from an awareness of the entrenched and cumulative nature of group inequalities. The result has been an array of programmes that I call, collectively, a policy of compensatory discrimination. These compensatory discrimination policies entail systematic departures from norms of formal equality (such as merit, evenhandedness and indifference to ascriptive characteristics). These departures are justified in seven ways: First, preferential treatment may be viewed as needed assurance of personal fairness, a guarantee against the persistence of discrimination in subtle and indirect forms. Second, such policies are justified in terms of the beneficial results that they will presumably promote: integration, use of neglected talent, more equitable distribution, etc. With these two'the anti-discrimination theme and the general welfare theme'is entwined a notion of historical restitution, or reparation, to offset the systematic and cumulative deprivations suffered by lower castes in the past. These multiple justifications point to the complexities of pursuing such a policy and of assessing its performance.