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Comment by AussieWog93 | Hacker News Reader

>Some called caste equity a form of reverse discrimination against the highest-ranked castes because of India’s affirmative action system for access to education and government jobs.

I've heard some pretty horrible stories about this in particular; like Brahmin kids being legally adopted into Sudra families in order to get into a reserved position at a State University, and rich kids with private tutors getting given further advantage over poor kids doing all the work themselves because they happen to be of a lower caste.

Just like in every other country, affirmative action does nothing but help members of a specific group who are already advantaged.

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There is 70% affirmitive action. If you are a Dalit with 50% mark you will get admission to a medical seat and you will be a cardiac surgeon, but if a brahmin girl gets 99% she will not get admission and will be a clerk. Go figure the Indian system. This is why you see thousands of Brahmins in Silicon valley as they are kicked out or disgusted with Indian political system of favoring lower castes. USA benefited immensely from it.

>If you are a Dalit with 50% mark you will get admission to a medical seat and you will be a cardiac surgeon, but if a brahmin girl gets 99% she will not get admission and will be a clerk.

Is it possible for someone with a 50% GPA to finish a cardiac surgery training program in India? Or is that a gross exaggeration?

I'm sure OP is exaggerating a bit but it's no different than the American affirmative action system where if you are black/native then you can get a 1300 SAT and get into an T20 school but if you are Asian then you need a 1600 and a laundry list of achievements.

I'm trying to get a sense of how exaggerated it is.

In the US, someone with a 1300 SAT has a good chance to graduate from T20 school, but someone with a 50% GPA is unlikely to be admitted to any medical school, and if they are admitted, they have roughly 0% chance of getting accepted to / completing a cardiac surgery residency, which is incredibly demanding.

This is indeed true, 50% mark is not exactly like 50% GPA but affirmitive action in India is so f*ed up. I know very bright people kicked out and come to USA for BS in reputed colleges. This is reason, India not able to progress as fast as China or USA

>If you are a Dalit with 50% mark you will get admission to a medical seat and you will be a cardiac surgeon, but if a brahmin girl gets 99% she will not get admission and will be a clerk.

That brahmin girl may also go onto become the Defense Minister of India and then the finance minister because she is the right caste.

Meanwhile, the poor Dalit surgeon will be ostracized at his work and gets harassed by casteist everyday and is so depressed that he can't sleep and thinks about suicide all the time.

Nepotism tastes like butter but Affirmative action tastes bitter. This is the definition of hypocrisy.

> affirmative action does nothing but help members of a specific group who are already advantaged.

If you don't know any highly skilled people from disadvantaged backgrounds that benefited from some affirmative action, that says more about you and your environment than the policy. There are definitely problems where affirmative action gets exploited, but it is horribly reductionist to find the entire tool useless because of that.

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