Why Ambedkar's caste identity stands misunderstood today

There is a saying that truth often gets tormented but never gets defeated — and in the end, it always wins. In the case of Dr BR Ambedkar, this proposition is yet to be testified, even as the government has recently celebrated his 125th birth anniversary.

Besides everything, he was intellectually honest and always vocal about right and wrong. He had always been upfront about fighting for women’s liberation, annihilation of caste and breaking the superstition barrier.

Barrier

Ambedkar did not care about the establishment when he had a tryst with the truth. Standing for equal right to property for daughters was not at all easy in the 1950s.

It was quite obvious that the masses would be against whoever spoke about equal rights to property.

Ambedkar introduced the Hindu Code Bill in Parliament after consulting Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.

The Hindu Code Bill embodied the provision of equal share in ancestral property for sons and daughters. There was a lot of criticism in the country over the bill.

This forced the Congress to pull back and the bill was defeated.

Similarly, when Sheikh Abdullah and other like-minded people approached Nehru to include a special provision for Jammu & Kashmir in the Constitution, he agreed. He, however, suggested that Abdullah should meet Ambedkar for an agreement.

When the Kashmiri leader met Ambedkar, he was bluntly told that if Jammu & Kashmir as a border state should get special provisions, then even Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Bengal and provinces of the North-East, which are also borderstates, should get similar provisions.

Here it needs to be emphasised that Article 370 was framed, but it wasn’t done by Ambedkar. Though he wrote most provisions of the Constitution, he was neither allowed to write Article 370 nor did he support it.

Ambedkar stood for annihilation of caste, but are his followers doing that today? Rather, there is activism for further consolidation of caste identity.

By creating caste identities, it is much easier to have a personal gain and bargaining power with institutions and the government. Therefore, the truth that he wanted to prevail, has not found its place yet.

Association

On December 12, 1935, Babasaheb received a letter from the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal in Lahore, inviting him to be its president. He thought that it was an association of upper caste Hindus whose only idea was to reform the caste system. At first, Ambedkar refused to accept the invitation but later on, when persuaded, he gave his consent.

The association was supposed to meet during Easter, but it was postponed till May 1936. There was, however, huge resentment in Lahore for inviting Ambedkar.

Bhai Parmanand (ex-president of Hindu Mahasabha), Mahatma Hansraj, Dr Gokulchand Narang and Raja Rajendranath, among others, sidelined the then Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal secretary, Santram.

The leaders of the Mandal wanted to get a written draft of Ambedkar’s speech in advance. There was a constant pressure on Ambedkar to get his essay, Annihilation of Caste, vetted in Lahore before the conference, but he remained firm.

One must realise that during that period, Lahore was the centre of northwest India, and had Ambedkar agreed to the suggestions of the Mandal, a large number of upper caste Hindus would have accepted his leadership.

He did not fall prey to this temptation and later on, his essay Annihilation of Caste was published in Mumbai and was also translated into many languages.

Truth

Ambedkar’s truth has not become empirical till date. As a matter of fact, these days, even the so-called Scheduled Castes try to strengthen the caste system for their political gains. Maintaining intellectual honesty is putting oneself at risk and a high price might have to be paid for it. There is no certainty that Ambedkar’s truth is being incorporated, practised or even debated.

Usually, people are against change, and it’s not necessary that truth always prevails. There have been statesmen like Kabir who spoke the truth but they remain confined to books and talks. Very few are practically followed these days.

This truth has kept haunting Ambedkar, who is still not understood and imbibed by people — not even the downtrodden. Had the poor walked on his path of truth, they would have at least achieved partial success, if not a complete victory.

It is not at all necessary that what has not been done till now cannot be done tomorrow. The day is eagerly awaited when a casteless society is established and India joins the ranks of developed countries.