Economic & Political Weekly EPW april 1, 2017 vol lIi no 13 15 COMMENTARY Economic & Political Weekly EPW april 1, 2017 vol lIi no 13 15 IIMs and Reservations Manish Thakur, R Rajesh Babu By resisting the implementation of reservations in their doctoral programmes and faculty appointments, the Indian Institutes of Management are not fulfilling their mandate of acting as socially responsible public institutions. T he issue of reservation in faculty appointments and in doctoral progammes (fellowship progra- mmes) has brought the Indian Institutes of Management ( IIMs ) back to the centre of public discourse. Though the IIMs are a minuscule part of the higher education landscape in the country, they have always occupied a disproportionately large space in the public imagination. The IIMs, though public institutions, have emerged as centres of excellence in professional education with appreciable global recognition. Of late, their num- bers have increased to 19. By covering a wide geographical area, they cater to the felt needs of access to management edu- cation by the increasing numbers of as- piring youth. In this sense, the IIMs can be seen as trendsetters in an otherwise not so encouraging scene of higher edu- cation in India. Expectedly, what hap- pens in the IIMs has wider ramifications for higher education in particular and the country in general. This is equally applicable in the present case of reser- vations. The way the IIMs respond to this pressing issue would be a test case for addressing the larger issue of social access and inclusion in elite educational institutions in our country. It is not that the IIMs have been totally indifferent to the practice of reservations. At present, the IIMs have the Government of India mandated 49.5% quota in place. The quotas of 15% for the Scheduled Castes and 7.5% for the Scheduled Tribes in the postgraduate programme have been there since the 1970s. The 27% quota for the non-creamy layer of the Other Backward Classes is in operation since 2008. In effect, the reservation de- bate about IIMs boils down to extending similar reservations to their fellowship programmes and faculty appointments. As a matter of fact, the IIMs have man- aged to do without reservation despite continuing demand from the govern- ment and other stakeholders. Recently, the enduring issue of reservation has been brought to the centre stage by none other than the minister of human resource development, who reminded the IIMs of their constitutional obli- gations at the 20 September 2016 coordination committee meeting of the chairpersons and directors of IIMs at Shillong. It would be interesting to see how the IIMs respond to this renewed demand for openness that they have historically circumvented. Reproduction of Inequality The IIMs are not politically and ideolo- gically neutral institutions reeling out innocuous professional managers and business leaders for the furtherance of the efficiency needs of business and related organisations. Undoubtedly, grad- uates coming out of the IIMs form an elite group. They share a set of values or understandings that are definitional to an identifiable elite group to protect their sectional interests. And the IIMs do bestow status and credentials to individ- uals and preselect and socialise them for certain kinds of elite roles. Through their socialisation process they contrib- ute to the production of a shared cultur- al code that is the hallmark of an elite. The years spent at an IIM, and the result- ant membership of an alumni network, are a valued form of cultural capital. In- deed, in contemporary times, one’s alma mater does provide privileged access to resources that matter for elite reproduc- tion. Today, the mobility functions of caste and property have been replaced to a large extent by these exclusive boys’ (and girls’) clubs and the coveted aca- demic pedigree that institutions like the IIMs offer. These new elites do not comprise a sectional interest group alone. They are the new role models for the aspiring youth. They are part of the new intelli- gentsia which drives the general dis- course of society on critical issues of national importance. They preside over important governmental committees, serve on advisory groups, and act as glamorous consultants to various ministries, besides occupying cultural space in the media. Gone are the days when opinion-makers would invariably come from the civil services or the worlds of politics and The views expressed are personal. Manish Thakur (mt@iimcal.ac.in) and R Rajesh Babu (rajeshbabu@iimcal.ac.in) teach at the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta.