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Why ‘Reservation Hatao’ agitation at Jantar Mantar is a direct assault on women

If the Reservation Hatao Andolan succeeds in replacing caste-based reservations with economic filters, it will be a catastrophic regression for women, especially Bahujan women.

Delhi’s Jantar Mantar is currently hosting an angry performance. This agitation was initially called the Reservation Hatao Andolan, or RHA. It has now rebranded itself as the Reservation Reforms Andolan, or RRA. It has been a clever modification rather than an outright cancellation of affirmative action, which would have faced strong criticism from progressive sections.

What is involved are high-stakes ministerial huddles, a “cordial discussion” between the agitation’s leaders and the Union minister JP Nadda, along with quiet undercurrents of rifts within the leadership. Following weeks of street mobilisations and police detentions, negotiators are preparing for a crucial follow-up press conference on 7 September. As talks continue, both the ruling dispensation and the opposition seem dangerously blindsided to the implications of the proposed reforms, especially for women.

Today, every political party aggressively thumps its chest over Nari Shakti or slogans like “Smash Patriarchy” to court a newly assertive female electorate. But the actual policy text in the charter of RHA/RRA is completely amnesiac from a gendered perspective. If this movement succeeds in replacing India’s traditional caste-based reservations with economic filters, it will be a catastrophic regression for women, especially Bahujan women. It will reverse decades of hard-won literacy, autonomy, and intersectoral mobility.

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Women as the last and least

The core lacuna of RHA is that it views Indian citizens in silos. It considers them isolated, gender-neutral economic entities. It ignores the foundational sociology of the Indian household: when opportunities and resources are scarce, women are always the last and the least to be considered.

The movement is banking on “One Family, One Quota” as a proposal. The logic given is that it prevents affluent families within marginalised communities from garnering all the benefits. It echoes the Supreme Court’s 2024 judgment on sub-classification and a “creamy layer” among reserved categories. It needs to be understood, however, that a strict horizontal cap on a rural or semi-urban Dalit or Adivasi household creates an intra-household zero-sum game.

When a marginalised family has only one ticket to systemic mobility, who ought to get it? In a male-centric society that sees sons as long-term social security and daughters as paraya dhan (alien wealth), the choice is obviously the son. This male heir will monopolise the lifetime benefit. Families are then likely to sacrifice their daughters’ higher education to prioritise their sons.

In recent times, the government’s All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) data shows that the Gross Enrolment........

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