BABA SAHEB
Babasaheb Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar was born on 14th April, 1891 at Mhow, near Indore in the then Central Province, now Madhya Pradesh. He was the fourteenth child of his parents. The life of Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar was marked by struggles but he proved that every hurdle in life can be surmounted with talent and firm determination. The biggest barrier in his life was the caste system according to which the family he was born in was considered ‘untouchable’. In the year 1907, young Bhimrao passed the Matriculation examination from Bombay University with flying colors. Later in 1913 he graduated in Political Science and Economics from Bombay University. Around the same time his father passed away. Although he was going through a bad time, Bhimrao decided to accept the opportunity to go to USA for further studies at Columbia University for which he was awarded a scholarship by the Maharaja of Baroda. Bhimrao remained abroad from 1913 to 1917 and again from 1920 to 1923. During this period, he had established himself as an eminent intellectual. Columbia University had awarded him the Ph.D. for his thesis, which was later published in a book form under the title “The Evolution of Provincial Finance in British India”. But his first published article was “Castes in India – Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development”. During his stay in London from 1920 to 1923, he also completed his thesis titled “The Problem of the Rupee” for which he was awarded the degree of D.Sc. Before his departure for London, he had taught at a College in Bombay. By the time he returned to India in April 1923, Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar had equipped himself fully to wage war against the practice of untouchability on behalf of the untouchable and the downtrodden. Meanwhile the political situation in India had undergone substantial changes and the freedom struggle in the country had made significant progress. While Bhimrao was an ardent patriot on one hand, he was the savior of the oppressed, women and poor on the other. He fought for them throughout his life. In 1923, he set up the ‘Bahishkrit Hitkarini Sabha (Outcastes Welfare Association), for spreading education and culture amongst the downtrodden, improving the economic status and raising matters concerning their problems in the proper forums to focus attention on them and finding solutions to the same. The problems of the downtrodden were centuries old and difficult to overcome. Their entry into temples was forbidden. They could not draw water from public wells and ponds. Their admission in schools was prohibited. In 1927, he led the Mahad March at the Chowdar Tank. This marked the beginning of the anti-caste and ant-priest movement. The temple entry movement launched by Dr. Ambedkar in 1930 at Kala ram temple, Nasik is another landmark in the struggle for human rights and social justice. In the meantime, British Prime Minister Ramsay McDonald announced the ‘Communal Award’ as a result of which in several communities including the ‘depressed classes’ were given the right to have separate electorates. This was a part of the overall design of the British to divide and rule. Gandhiji wanted to defeat this design and went on a fast unto death to oppose it. On 24th September 1932, Dr. Ambedkar and Gandhiji reached an understanding, which became the famous Poona Pact. According to this Pact, in addition to the agreement on electoral constituencies, reservations were provided for untouchables in Government jobs and legislative assemblies. The provision of separate electorate was dispensed with. The Pact carved out a clear and definite position for the downtrodden on the political scene of the country. It opened up opportunities of education and government service for them and also gave them a right to vote. Dr. Ambedkar attended all the three Round Table Conferences in London and each time, forcefully projected his views in the interest of the ‘untouchable’. He exhorted the downtrodden sections to raise their living standards and to acquire as much political power as possible. After a while Dr. Ambedkar, organized the Independent Labor Party, participated in the provincial elections and was elected to the Bombay Legislative Assembly. During these days he stressed the need for abolition of the ‘Jagirdari’ system, pleaded for workers
Fight to strike and addressed a large number of meetings and conferences in Bombay Presidency. In 1939, during the Second World War, he called upon Indians to join the Army in large numbers to defeat Nazism, which he said, was another name for fascism. In 1947, when India became independent, he became the first Law Minister of Independent India. Dr. Ambedkar had differences of opinion with the Government over the Hindu Code Bill, which led to his resignation as Law Minister.
The Constituent Assembly entrusted the job of drafting the Constitution to a committee and Dr.
Ambedkar was elected as Chairman of the Drafting Committee. While he was busy with drafting the Constitution, India faced several crises. In the beginning of 1948, Dr. Ambedkar completed the draft of the Constitution and presented it in the Constituent Assembly. In November 1949, this draft was adopted with very few amendments. Many provisions have been made in the Constitution to ensure social justice for scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and backward classes. Dr. Ambedkar was of the opinion that traditional religious values should be given up and new ideas adopted. He laid special emphasis on dignity, unity, freedom and rights for all citizens as enshrined in the Constitution. Dr. Ambedkar advocated democracy in every field: Social, Economic and Political. For him Social Justice meant maximum happiness to the maximum number of people. On October 14, 1956 he embraced Buddhism along with many of his followers. The same year he completed his last writing ‘Buddha and His Dharma’. Dr. Ambedkar’s patriotism started with the upliftment of the downtrodden and the poor. He fought for their equality and rights. His ideas about patriotism were not only confined to the abolition of colonialism, but he also wanted freedom for every individual. For him freedom without equality, democracy and equality without freedom could lead to absolute dictatorship. On 6th December, 1956, Babasaheb Dr. B.R. Ambedkar attained ‘Mahaparinirvan’ at 26, Alipur Road, Delhi. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar is known as the architect of Constitution of India. His hard work in the drafting of the constitution and making it a powerful tool for social and economic empowerment of the downtrodden are praiseworthy. He ensured that there are appropriate checks and balances in the democratic system of Govt. and ensured that the three wings of executive, legislature and judiciary function independently with accountability to one another. In the course of his most eventful life, Dr. Ambedkar made outstanding contribution as an Economist, Sociologist, Anthropologist, Educationist, Journalist, as an authority on comparative religion, as a policy-maker, as an administrator, and as a parliamentarian.
Here are some famous books written by honorable Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
- Annihilation of Caste – B.R. Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste is one of the most important, yet neglected, works of political writing from India. Written in 1936, it is an audacious denunciation of Hinduism and its caste system. Ambedkar – a figure like W.E.B. Du Bois – offers a scholarly critique of Hindu scriptures, scriptures that sanction a rigidly hierarchical and iniquitous social system. The world’s best-known Hindu, Mahatma Gandhi, responded publicly to the provocation. The hatchet was never buried. Arundhati Roy introduces this extensively annotated edition of Annihilation of Caste in ‘The Doctor and the Saint,’ examining the persistence of caste in modern India, and how the conflict between Ambedkar and Gandhi continues to resonate. Roy takes us to the beginning of Gandhi’s political career in South Africa, where his views on race, caste and imperialism were shaped. She tracks Ambedkar’s emergence as a major political figure in the national movement, and shows how his scholarship and intelligence illuminated a political struggle beset by sectarianism and obscurantism. Roy breathes new life into Ambedkar’s anti-caste utopia, and says that without a Dalit revolution, India will continue to be hobbled by systemic inequality.
- The problem of Rupee: its origin and its solution – The book analyses the problems faced by Indian currency during a period when local businesses and the British administration were at loggerheads, it had a tremendous effect on the Indian currency’s value. Dr. Ambedkar argued that the British government kept the exchange rate too much(overvalued) so that they could sell their goods in India. Worth mentioning here that overvalued makes the import cheaper and export costlier. The book argues for the stabilization of monetary affairs and exchange rates. It eventually led to the formation of the Reserve Bank of India in 1935.
- What Congress and Gandhi have done to the Untouchables – Ambedkar has shown the harsh reality and true faces of the Congress leaders (and Gandhi in particular) of his era who acted no less than racists when it came to granting privileges and showing concerns to the depressed classes. He even goes on to state facts which suggests how Gandhi tried very hard to appease the Muslim community but sidelined untouchables.
- Caste in India: their mechanism, Genesis and development – In this book, Ambedkar made a presentation a social phenomenon that emerged from the strategy of the Brahmins who adopted a strictly endogamous matrimonial regime, leading the other groups to do the same in order to emulate this self-proclaimed elite. He said that “the superposition of endogamy on exogamy means the creation of caste”.
- Who were Shudras? – B.R. Ambedkar aims to provide clarity on the origins of the Shudra class in the caste system in India through this book of his. It was initially published in 1946, a
time when caste discrimination in society was rampant, and the lower castes continued to suffer immensely. He provides evidence from the Vedic scriptures to provide a much clearer and relatively undistorted picture on the origin of the caste system in India. The book also outright denies the Aryan invasion theory, that is still a topic which continues to be debated upon. The Aryan invasion theory is the hypothesis that, Aryans invaded India and bought about the demise of the Indus Valley civilization. As a result of this, the dominant theory became that the upper castes that is the Brahmins, were people who descended from these Aryan conquerors. Brahmins were those people of the purest Aryan blood, while the lower castes were a mix or purely Dravidian. This theory of being of Aryan descent also served as a narrative in justifying the rule by whites in India. Ambedkar substantiates this claim by saying that there is no record of an invasion in the Vedas. Had the Aryans conquered India, it is only natural to assume that they would have recorded such an event. This would mean that Aryans were native to India in the first place and not some foreign invader race. To understand all this in the broader context, we must understand the caste system.
- The Untouchables: Who were they? And why they became untouchables? – This book is a sequel to my treatise called The Shudras—Who they were and how they came to be the Fourth Varna of the Indo-Aryan Society which was published in 1946. Besides the Shudras, the Hindu Civilization has produced three social classes whose existence has not received the attention it deserves. The three classes are:-
(i) The Criminal Tribes who number about 20 million or so; (ii) The Aboriginal Tribes who number about 15 million; and (iii) The Untouchables who number about 50 million.
The existence of these classes is an abomination. The Hindu civilization, gauged in the light of these social products, could hardly be called civilization. It is a diabolical contrivance to suppress and enslave humanity. Its proper name would be infamy. What else can be said of a civilization which has produced a mass of people who are taught to accept crime as an approved means of earning their livelihood, another mass of people who are left to live in full bloom of their primitive barbarism in the midst of civilization and a third mass of people who are treated as an entity beyond human intercourse and whose mere touch is enough to cause pollution? In any other country the existence of these classes would have led to searching of the heart and to investigation of their origin. But neither of these has occurred to the mind of the Hindu. The reason is simple. The Hindu does not regard the existence of these classes as a matter of apology or shame and feels no responsibility either to atone for it or to inquire into its origin and growth. On the other hand, every Hindu is taught to believe that his civilization is not only the most ancient but that it is also in many respects altogether unique. No Hindu ever feels tired of repeating these claims. That the Hindu civilization is the most ancient, one can understand and even allow. But it is not quite so easy to understand on what grounds they rely for claiming that the Hindu civilization is a unique one. The Hindus may not like it, but so far as it strikes nonHindus, such a claim can rest only on one ground. It is the existence of these classes for which the Hindu civilization is responsible. That the existence of such classes is a unique phenomenon, no Hindu need repeat, for nobody can deny the fact. One only wishes that the Hindu realized that it was a matter for which there was more cause for shame than pride.
- The Buddha and his Dhamma – B.R. Ambedkar’s magnum opus, The Buddha and his Dhamma, was barely completed before his death and was published posthumously in 1957. The book is known for Ambedkar’s review and analysis of the vast Buddhist canon and literature. This is the first critical edition of The Buddha and his Dhamma. Along with a new Introduction, it includes footnotes indicating sources and annotations explaining various topics of discussion. The annotations provide useful information on canons like Suttas and Dhammapada indicating their authoritativeness in the Buddhist tradition and discuss the modifications effected in Ambedkar’s use of the source material. An analytical index helps locate various passages and themes in the original text.
- Mr. Gandhi and the emancipation – In response to the invitation of the Chairman of the Indian section of the Institute of Pacific Relations, I wrote in August last year a Paper on the Problem of the Untouchables of India for the Session of the Conference which was due to be held on December 1942 at Mont’ Tramblant in Quebec in Canada. The Paper is printed in the proceedings of the Conference. Ever since it became known that I had written such a Paper, the leaders of the Untouchables and Americans interested in their problem have been pressing me to issue it separately in the form of a book and make it available to the general public. It was not possible to refuse the demand. At the same time, I could not without breach of etiquette publish the paper until the proceedings of the Conference were made public. I am now told by the Secretary of the Pacific Relations Conference that the proceedings have been made public and there can be no objection to the publication of my Paper if I desired it. This will explain why the Paper is published nearly 10 months after it was written.