191–200 of 451 posts
India will not get anywhere meaningful as long as this institutionalized discrimination persists. "backward", really ? are we in the 21st century ?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And yet 1 out of 180 CS professors are OBCs despite the population being over 40%. It’s probably closer to the welfare queen trope. Yeah, there are a few people who cheat the system, like any other system in the world. Thaw existence of cheaters does not negate the very real problems and challenges faced by the actual “victims”.
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The caste system in India is layered like onions. The author says he was born as OBC (Other Backward Classes), but that's not the lowest in the overall scheme. SC (Scheduled Castes) are considered lower in the hierarchy. ST (Scheduled Tribes) are considered even lower (there are variations across states and regions, so please take this with a pinch of salt). While the atrocities and punishments by "upper" caste peopl…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And yet 1 out of 180 CS professors are OBCs despite the population being over 40%. It’s probably closer to the welfare queen trope. Yeah, there are a few people who cheat the system, like any other system in the world. Thaw existence of cheaters does not negate the very real problems and challenges faced by the actual “victims”.
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This caste problems continue in the US, instead of leaving behind such ridiculous biases it becomes a part of an US company… https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/googles-caste-bias-pr...
Since this is about Google, where I worked: > The Google spokesperson said that caste discrimination has “no place in our workplace and it’s prohibited in our policies.” I can testify that Ads was very heavily Indian, much more than the general employee percentages would predict. I don't know if it still is. Sridhar Ramaswamy ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sridhar_Ramaswamy ) probably had something to do with that.…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I worked in 3 different companies (Hyderabad, Bangalore) in South India and did not see any evidence of caste discrimination Are you of a member of a discriminated-against caste? If not, it may simply be it wasn't visible to you.
It doesn’t work like that. This isn’t like racism where differences are immediately superficially apparent. You need to have conversations bordering on light interrogations to determine who is what.
This caste problems continue in the US, instead of leaving behind such ridiculous biases it becomes a part of an US company… https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/googles-caste-bias-pr...
Since this is about Google, where I worked: > The Google spokesperson said that caste discrimination has “no place in our workplace and it’s prohibited in our policies.” I can testify that Ads was very heavily Indian, much more than the general employee percentages would predict. I don't know if it still is. Sridhar Ramaswamy ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sridhar_Ramaswamy ) probably had something to do with that.…
I am at University of Toronto right now. I have only been here for some months but I have seen enough things to get a sense of the "politics" of the place. Also, I've been in many of the world's top universities (Caltech, Cornell, KAUST, Oxford, Stanford, UNAM, and some others with less pompous names); either studying, visiting, working, w/e. I've been doing this for close to 20 years now. I know a lot about what academia is and how it works behind the scenes.
With that said ... University of Toronto is, by far, the most amicable, egalitarian and open academic environment I've ever had the chance to be in. I have several Indian friends I've made during my stay, and not a single time has the issue of caste come up to relevance. Caste doesn't have anything to do, at all, with how this particular University chooses their faculty members.
I know OP is not directly (or is he?) accusing UofT of taking part on this, but someone reading this could easily get that impression since 1) he's using his academic page to publish this "opinion" and 2) he states:
>I had begun to mention references to my caste in Facebook/Twitter threads in the past two years. I was, however, not ready to publicly declare it until as it seemed too risky.
So, to all other readers, I can assure you that caste had absolutely nothing to do with OPs election/non-election as a faculty member and I really wanted to set the record straight on what actually is a really nice place that treats all of its members with dignity and respect.
Just as India is large and complex, so is everyone's experience. 59.5% of IIT seats are reserved for backward castes - that is HUGE in a nation full of students competing for the 40% seats available for the general category. The entrance exam score gap between reserved and general is massive (numbers are public) and it shows in their relative academic performance. One could make an argument that the Indian Government…
No one wants to talk about the giant elephant in the room: reservation system vs. competence. Go to any govt office: the chief of some division is incompetent, some low-level clerk does the heavy lifting. Of course, this low-level clerk happens to be from non-reserved category, as both recruitment and promotions in the government are driven by reservations. Why people (both reserved and non-reserved) send their kids…