Thursday, May 30, 2013

India's uncomfortable truths on film

Monday, May 27, 2013

Pledge given by Dr Ambedkar to Buddhist People

         Pledge given by Dr Ambedkar to Buddhist People

On the eve of the great conversion at Nagpur on October 14, 1956 Dr. 
Ambedkar said that Buddhism could serve not only India, but the 
world. Buddhism is indispensable to world peace and he asked 
Buddhists to pledge not only to liberate themselves but also elevate 
their country and the world. He said,“By discarding my ancient 
religion which stood for inequality and oppression, today I am reborn. I 
have no faith in the philosophy of incarnation; and it is wrong and 
mischievous to say that Buddha was an incarnation of Vishnu. I am 
no more a devotee of any Hindu god or goddess. I will not perform 
shradha. I will strictly follow the eightfold path of Buddha. Buddhism 
is a true religion and I will lead a life guided by the three principles of 
knowledge, right path and compassion.” 
Dr. Ambedkar denounced Hinduism, its customs and traditions, and 
declared that from that moment onwards he would strive for the spread 
of equality among people. To us ,he explained that “a great 
responsibility had fallen on your shoulders in connection with the 
upholding of Buddhism; and if you would not follow rigidly and 
nobly the principles of Buddhism, it would mean that the Mahars 
reduced it to a miserable state.” 
Dr. Ambedkar set the wheel of Dhamma in motion once again, 
spreading the message of his Master. Buddhists feel that, “the 
Dhamma Chakra was set to revolution by Dr.Ambedkar and it was the 
greatest religious revolution which India had witnessed in modern 
times.” 
The following are the 22 golden rules Buddhist has to follow:
1. I will not accept Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh as God and will not 
worship them. 
2. I will not accept Rama and Krishna as God and will not worship 
them. 
3. I will not accept Gauri, Ganpati etc, belonging to Hindu canon, as 
God /Goddesses and will not worship them. 
4. I do not have any faith in divine incarnation. 5. That the Buddha is the incarnation of Vishnu is a mischievous and 
false Propaganda. I do not believe in it. 
6. I will not perform shraddha Paksh or Pind Dana (Rituals to respect 
the dead). 
7. I will not act contrary to principles and teachings of Buddhism. 
8. I will not get any function performed in which the Brahmin is 
officiating as a Priest. 
9. I believe that all human beings are equal. 
10. I will strive to establish equality. 
11. I will follow the Eightfold path prescribed by the Buddha. 
12. I will abide by the Ten Parmitas prescribed by the Buddha. 
13. I will show loving kindness to all animals and look after them. 
14. I will not commit theft. 
15. I will not commit adultery. 
16. I will not speak lies. 
17. I will not indulge in Liquor Drinking. 
18. I will live my life by relating Pradnya(Knowledge),Sheel(Purity 
of action) and Karuna(Compassion). 
19. I renounce Hinduism; which has proved detrimental to progress and 
prosperity of my predecessors and which has regarded human 
beings as unequal and despicable; and embrace Buddhism. 
20. I have ascertained that Buddhism is Saddamma(Pure way of life). 
21. I believe that this (embracing Buddhism) is my new birth. 
22. I take the Pledge that hereafter I shall live/behave as per the 
teaching of the Buddha.

Friday, May 10, 2013

Understand Bahujan Philosophy instead of proletysing






    Understand Bahujan Philosophy instead of proletysing



Indian History

This is in response to letter from Dr. Choudhrie in DV of Sept. 1-15. I am glad to know that he is trying to study Ancient Indian History. Not only it is illuminating, but it throws ample light on the happenings of today. One finds that from times immemorial, the struggle between the so called upper caste savarnas on one side and the rest of population on other side is going on. It had assumed different names, shapes and forms during the course of different periods of history, and the history of India is nothing but the history of conflict between these two ideologies, as is well demonstrated by Dr. Ambedkar. The present name for this is bahujan-vad and bahujan-virodh-vad. The present day protagonists of these are Phuley, Shahu and Ambedkar on one side and Tilak, Gandhi and Golwalkar on the other. All the leaders of christians and muslims need to understand this point and explain it to the gullible ignorant and illiterate christian and muslim masses, instead of thinking in lines of proletising Dalits. These are the only two ideologies in present day India, and sooner the people understand this, earlier they will be freed from their slavery.
Unchristian side of the Indian Church
In his rejoinder to Dr. Chaudhrie's letter, VTR has very aptly described the situation. If I remember it correctly, in his article of above name published in DV some two years ago, he had commented that the missionaries are educating the children of oppressors, who tomorrow will come to power and see that these very schools be closed. It is like feeding milk to the serpents' offsprings. He had also suggested that at least 50% of seats in all christian convents must be given only to SCs and STs at no charge, and the deficit be made good by charging double fees from the children of oppressors. I think that article was a master piece.

Ambedkar's Advice to Christians

I like to make all conversant with one of the speeches of Dr. Ambedkar, during the period of active consideration of choice of religion to adopt. May be, this might clear doubts, if any. The speech delivered to Indian Christians of Sholapur. Published in 'Janata' of 5.2.1938, reproduced from 'Dnyanodaya'
"From the available religions and personalities in the world, I consider only two - Buddha and Christ for conversion. We want a religion for me and my followers which will teach equality freedom among men, and how man must behave with men and God, how child should behave with father etc.
"Missionaries feel they have done their duty when they convert an untouchable to Christianity. They do not look after their political rights. I find this is a big fault in Christians. Because they have not entered into politics up till now. It is difficult for any institution to survive without political support. We, Untouchables, though are ignorant and illiterate, we are in movement. That is why we have 15 seats in the Legislative Assembly. Students are getting scholarships, there are government hostels. Such is not the case of Christian students. If an untouchable student getting scholarship get converted, his scholarship is stopped though his financial status remains same. If you were in politics, things would have been opposed.
"Your society is educated. Hundreds of boys and girls are matric. These people have not agitated against this injustice unlike the uneducated untouchables. If any girl becomes a nurse or any boy becomes a teacher they are involved in their own affairs, they do not get involved in public affairs. Even clerks and officers are busy in their work, he ignores the social injustice. Your society is so much educated, how many are District judges or magistrates? I tell you, this is because of your neglect towards politics, because there in nobody to talk of and fight for your rights. ..." [translated from marathi-M. F. Ganjare's vol. III. p.142 ff.]

BSP and Kanshiram

To relieve the humanity from suffering, in India, the remedy is to develop the spirit of Bahujan Samaj. We cannot progress by merely "Dalit Unity", or by only "Dalit Muslim Unity", or by only "Dalit Christian Unity", we have to build a Bahujan Samaj, which is not an easy task. One has to understand the mechanics of Bahujan Samaj. There are many misconceptions about BSP, Kanshiram and Mayavati, purposefully spread by vested interests. One has to understand Bahujan Philosophy with all its intricacies. It is pity that Dr. Choudhrie could not get time to understand BSP while he was in Punjab. I hope he will have ample opportunity to understand it in M.P., where there is remarkable influence of BSP. BSP is not merely a political party unlike many others; it is a movement. One must read Phuley, Shahu Ambedkar and follow it with reading about Kanshiram and BSP.

Social service and social transformation

This is the important point which one must understand. Medical ethics says, prevention is better than cure. Instead of curing a disease give more attention to its prevention. To mend a fracture is social service, to create environment so that fractures do not take place is social transformation. To give vitamin pills to malnourished Adivasi children is social service, to give their parents employment so that they can buy wholesome food for their children is social transformation. To give charity to a beggar is social service, to create social atmosphere so that nobody has to beg is social change. To give rice at Rs. two per kilo when market price is Rs.7/- is social service, to raise the income of the person so that he can buy the rice at market price is social change. To feed the hungry is social service, to create situation where nobody remains hungry is social change. To teach an illiterate is social service, to destroy the social structure which made him illiterate is social change. To open a new school in thee vicinity of an illiterate poor colony of zopadpatti could be social service, to motivate the poor hungry and illiterate man to send his child to school walking five kilometers away even on an empty stomach is social transformation. To protect a weak person by giving him weapons is social service, to make him strong enough to let him manufacture and use his own weapons is social change. To teach an egalitarian prayer to a school child may be social service, to dynamite the scriptures spreading inequality among human beings is a social change. To assure protection to scared minorities may be social justice, to give them power so that they can defend themselves is social transformation.
I have great respect for missionaries who did a tremendous amount of good work. If there were no missionaries, there would have been no Phuley, no Shahu and no Ambedkar, let alone Kanshiram and Mayawati. In my humble opinion, missionaries in India are doing social service, and are the very best at that. but still it is not social transformation. I think here lies the importance of BSP, which is not a political party alone but a movement which stands for not social service or social justice alone but for social transformation and economic emancipation.




Righting wrongs, the American way


                     Righting wrongs, the American way

This is our basic conclusion: Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white separate but unequal.
This is the concluding remark of the Kerner Commission, set up to look into civil disorders in the US in 1967. The Commission's report states: "What white Americans have never fully understood but what the Negro can never forget, is that White society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it." The report stresses: "The major goal is the creation of a true union a single society and a single American identity."
The Kerner Commission, which came out with a host of socio-economic-educational measures, made a profound impact on white society, resulting in a host of affirmative action packages for the blacks, now called African-Americans. The African-Americans, Hispanics and native-Americans, together called the "minorities", constitute about 18 per cent of the total US population. It all began in 1969. The then US President, Johnson signed an executive order on March 5, 1969, leading to the creation of the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA). The MBDA was conceived as a nodal body, consisting of senior officials of the federal government, prominent minority businessmen, captains of private industry and representatives of financial institutions, to assist in the growth of minority business.
The basic philosophy behind the creation of the MBDA was to ensure that non-white racial/ethnic communities in the US got their due share of America's assets. The US government coined the slogan, "Democratising capital," when it observed: "Economic growth cannot be sustained without the inclusion of minority business and the infusion of capital into minority business." Today, non-white enterprise has evolved into a major player in the US economy. Diversityinc.com said last week, "For the first time, an African-American, Robert L. Johnson, has been certified to be a multibillionaire".
The list was compiled by New York based Security Pro, a research firm which tracks the growth of African-Americans in business. Now, Robert Johnson tops the list of the 100 richest African-Americans. Johnson's assets are worth over US$ 3 billion. The list for the year 2000, includes 15 more African-Americans, who broke into the US$ 100 million club in the year 2000. "The list does not include athletes or entertainers, unless they have come upon their fortunes while operating their own businesses," asserts the research firm.
Are these 100 richest African-Americans exceptions, which White society is parading before the global community? A survey conducted by the US Census Bureau in 1992 has an answer. According to the survey, of the total registered companies in the US (1.72 crores), minorities owned 21.49 lakhs, or 12.5 per cent of the total. Further, the economic return to minority-owned companies amounted to US$ 2.09 lakh millions, or 6.3 per cent of the total. Thus, what we clearly see is that of the total business transactions in the US, 6.3 per cent belongs to racial/ethnic minorities.
In India, it is difficult to think of one Dalit whose firm is traded publicly, or whose annual turnover reaches Rs the one crore mark. We can hardly name one Dalit (from a total Dalit population of about 21 crores), whose assets reach the Rs one billion mark? Obviously, the Dalits have been left out of the "money" market, out of business and trade, out of the stock exchanges. Dalits don't own land, they don't own urban assets. Barring government jobs and representation in legislative bodies, they don't exist in the nation's economic, intellectual and cultural lives. This prolonged exclusion of the Dalits, prevents them from "owning" India as "nation". This reinforces the belief that Dalits are not a part of India's nationhood. Will this not perpetuate, or rather intensify, social crises in India?
We know, that like American society, India too, has a legacy of split-societies one of touchables and the other of untouchables and tribals. The evolution of India into a Republic provided us a historic opportunity to draw a point of convergence, the same way the Kerner Commission did in the US. The delayed and reluctant response of white society in America is one of the finest examples we have before us. The Dalits' case, if comparable to any society, to any form of exclusion and oppression, is comparable with that of the blacks of America.
We will, in forthcoming columns, examine, how the dominant whites in America are approaching racial/ethnic questions? We will see how the private sector is responding to the federal government's keenness to share assets and institutions with racial/ethnic minorities in America? Maybe, we could learn something from them and perhaps India, as a nation, decides to evolve into a nation for all, the two societies evolving into one into a single social identity.

Short Story in Gujarati Dalit Literature


Short Story in Gujarati Dalit Literature


Economic and Political Weekly
This essay outlines the historical circumstances that produced Gujarati dalit literature and locates the short story within that tradition. A 'content analysis' of select dalit short stories is provided to acquaint the reader with some of the dominant and not-so-dominant themes recurring in them. Drawing on dalit sociology, the author highlights inequalities and anomalies of representation as they criss-cross with literary narratives and also demonstrates how dealing with them will require a readjustment of the dalit aesthetic.
Rita Kothari
Nirav Patel, the well known Gujarati dalit poet, sums up a discussion on novels by five leading Gujarati dalit novelists by stating: "The dalit experience portrayed in these novels can hardly be considered as complete. It is at best fragments of total reality. All the five novelists incidentally belong to one gender that is male and come from the predominant vankar caste which is at the top of the dalit pyramid and more backward castes like chamar and bhangi and many others are yet to articulate. One shade can- not create rainbows, let hundred flowers bloom to bring the spring." (Patel 1999: 11). Patel's observation points to gaps in the articulation and representation of dalit experiences important to fill for a dalit expression to be truly authentic. However, the very notion of authenticity is rife with contradictions. According to Chandraben Shrimali, a dalit and an erstwhile member of the Gujarat legislative assembly, the parameters of authenticity are the possession of male dalit writers. She perceives untouchability as a small curse of a larger, decrepit social system and focuses upon discrimination on grounds of gender rather than caste (interview with author, November 19, 2000). It is worth noting that Chandraben belongs to a relatively upper caste among the dalits and to that extent her version of the dalit problem may not be same as a woman from the bhangis, the lowest rung of the dalit ladder. These instances point to the fissures among the dalit writers regarding identity, representation and authenticity.
This brief prelude indicates that it is essential to maintain some degree of tentativeness and provisionality in any consideration of dalit literature. Any assessment of dalit literature would have to take into account a complex web of social, political and economic contexts, and the paper will turn to them in the last section. To move to the thrust and structure of this paper, Section I attempts an outline of historical circumstances that produced Gujarati dalit literature and locates the short story within that tradition. The same section also provides a 'content analysis' of select dalit short stories in order to acquaint non-Gujarati readers with some of the dominant and not-so-dominant themes recurring in the stories. Both Sections II and III draw upon dalit sociology to highlight inequalities and anomalies of representation as they criss-cross with literary narratives and also demonstrate how dealing with them will require a readjustment of the dalit aesthetic.
l Origins and Evolution
Unlike Marathi dalit literature, Gujarati dalit literature had a fairly delayed beginning. Unlike Marathi dalit literature, Gujarati dalit writing did not evolve out of a larger political movement against the upper caste. As a matter of fact, it grew as a response to the upper castes' virulent attacks on the reservation policy in 1981. The eventful year of 1981 and its consequent anti-reservation agitation created an environment of hostility and acrimony between upper caste Gujaratis and dalits. The very same environment was also helpful in evolving a dalit literary movement, which was up to then scattered and disorganised. In the initial years, dalit sensibility expressed itself largely through poetry, (poetry constitutes the largest part of the corpus of Gujarati dalit writing) that is replete with anguish and pain. Once the sporadic efforts found focus and organisation in the 1980s, the number of journals increased multifold and the dalit consciousness sharpened to include not just anguish, but also anger and protest against the upper castes. The 1990s witnessed a steady flow of short stories, poems, and to a lesser extent, novels. There was also a rise in animated debates about the aesthetic and ideological preoccupations of Gujarati dalit literature at large. Simultaneously, sociological and research studies on the dalits also increased, contributing thereby, to the formation of a dalit discourse in Gujarat.
Historically speaking, the first anthology of Gujarati dalit short story made its appearance with Gujarati Dalit Varta (1987) edited by Mohan Parmar and Harish Mangalam. The editors laid down the framework for dalit sensibility and epistemology and established that 'dalit-centredness' as it obtains in some literary works of the Gandhian era does not qualify as dalit literature. They asserted that historical dalitness (that is 'dalitness' by birth) was a mark of defining dalit literature and dalit writing should necessarily contain a dalit locale, dialects, customs and the history of injustice. The introduction to the book has since then served as a manifesto of dalit short fiction. In the years that followed, short stories by dalits became a standard fare in journals such as 'Samajmitra', 'Hayati' and 'Sarvanam'. After the mid-1990s, a formal institutionalisation of dalit literature took place through dalits' very own Dalit Sabha and Dalit Sahitya Akademi. Institutions such as the Gujarat Sahitya Parishad and Gujarat Sahitya Akademi representing the mainstream Gujarati literary establishment resisted dalit writing by asking whether 'lalit' (beauty) and 'dalit' (oppressed) could coexist. In recent years, the debate has become less intense, and some dalit works have formed a part of the literary canon and syllabi in universities. All these signs point to an arrival of dalit literature. The most recent anthology of dalit short story, Vanboti Vartao (2000) offers no attempt at creating definitions and frameworks, and exhibits confidence, range and energy hitherto unnoticed.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that most dalit short stories are sites of anger and protest conveyed through a specific locale and language. A central incident of atrocity inflicted upon a powerless dalit by an upper caste patel/darbar, the rural locale of a 'vas' (separate quarters for untouchables) and dialects stand as hallmarks of a good, authentic dalit short story in Gujarat. With that cultural and aesthetic mapping in mind, let us look at the preoccupations of Gujarati dalit short story in the discussion that follows:
The squalid, unhappy surrounding of an impoverished house in a vas form the physical backdrop of stories such as Dashrath Parmar's 'Paat', Madhukant Kalpit's 'Kulkatha', Harish Mangalam's 'Dayan' and many others. The vas itself is not a monolithic location, it consists of several parts such as 'vankar vas' (weavers' quarter), 'rohit vas' (tanners' quarter), 'bhangi vas ' (sweepers' quarter) and is thus an amalgamation of different castes, customs and languages among the dalits. However, we hardly ever come to know of any interaction amongst various communities through the stories mentioned above or through Pravin Darji's 'Maara Gaam Vachare', Joseph Macwan's 'Rotlo Najrai Gayo', Dalpat Chauhan's 'Badlo', Madhukant Kalpit's 'Kulkatha', Arvind Veghda's 'Rakhopa na Samp'. Many stories focus upon the sub-community of vankars (weavers), a few ('Jeev', 'Aaghat') deal with tanners and their 'negative right over raw hide' [Gopal Guru 2000].
Oppression to a greater or lesser extent, and anger/hurt as its response form a psychological backdrop which runs as a feature common to all the communities. Most stories show oppression and injustice as an inevitable part of an untouchable's life. Resistance, on the whole is very rare, and if it all, it comes in some cases from women protagonists. Stories such as Arvind Veghda's 'Rakhopa na Saamp', Vasantlal Parmar's 'Ek Chhaliyun Daal ni Khatar', Hasmukh Vaghela's 'Jhaal' establish a synonymy between a dalit woman and sexual exploitation. Dalit women form a staple diet for upper caste patels or darbars and the community has no choice but to submit to a demonaic tradition. On the other hand, Haar Paar's 'Somali', Mohan Parmar's 'Thali' and Dilip Ranpura's 'Ratan' show dalit women raising their heads against rape and sexual exploitation. Apart from sexual exploitation, a very common feature is treachery or betrayal. Upper castes make use of dalit gifts for curing diseases and childbirth (Harish Mangalam's 'Utatiyo' and 'Dayan'), for winning elections (Swapnil Mehta's 'Kadaach'), but humiliate the dalits once their interests are served. A pattern of naive faith or oblivion on the part of a dalit and an inhuman behaviour of an upper caste feudal lord are reenacted each time with very slight modifications. The impossibility of a relationship between an upper caste and lower caste forms the motif of B Kesharshivam's 'Reti no Mahal', Keshubhai Desai's 'Boteli Vas ', Mohan Parmar's 'Nakalank'. While the first two are based upon an 'oppressor and oppressed' plot, and to that extent is formulaic, 'Nakalank' is complex and sensitive. The vankar protagonist genuinely enjoys a patel's affection and trust, but the relationship gets murky because each is a product of long personal and communal history.
I now wish to turn to the not-so-dominant themes and somewhat non-formulaic situations. An interesting case in point is B Kesharshivam's 'God's Mercy', located in the turbulent times of communal riots in Gujarat. The story indicates solidarity among Muslims and dalits and establishes the Hindu feudal order as the traditional enemy of all minorities. Shailesh Parmar handles internal politics within the dalit community, the emergence of a dalit brahmin very effectively in 'Dhol ni Dandiye'. The bhangi (sweeper) protagonist, bewildered by discrimination not from an upper caste master, but a post-Mandal dalit elite rejoices when the former is rudely reminded of his low caste. Another critique of the lack of unity among the dalits is to be found in Dashrath Parmar's 'Jaat'. The educated, city-dwelling protagonist helps bridge gaps between the vankars and the rohits in order to prevent an appropriation of dalit deities by upper castes. Daniel Macwan's 'Lohini Lagni' and Dalpat Chauhan's 'Thandu Lohi' share the theme of 're-visiting,' critical outsider's perspective. In 'Thandu Lohi', the visit brings back bitter memories of humiliation, its residual effects continue when the protagonist continues to be called 'bhala no deekro' instead of by his title D B Parikh. Chandraben Shrimali (2000) entirely with the dalit ghettoes or slums in urban cities. Oppressive and poor ways of life within the community stunt its growth and worse, cause a premature death. The woman protagonist falls down the decrepit stairs and loses her child, the staircase (daadro) in the title serves as a metaphor for the entire community. Chandraben's story 'Dankh' brings out inconsistencies inherent in the so-called followers of Gandhi who visit the Harijan ashram but do not accept food from a Harijan. The anxiety regarding food operates with subtlety in Mavji Maheshwari's 'Safe Distance'. After settling down in an upwardly mobile urban colony, Ravjibhai takes comfort in the anonymity that city offers and rejoices in the support his brahmin neighbour extends. The neighbour discreetly avoids eating at Ravjibhai's house and maintains a 'safe distance'. The recurring theme of sexual exploitation mentioned earlier, finds a unique treatment in the hands of Jasumati Parmar, a dalit woman writer. The enemy is within - ready to trade his wife's body, out of poverty and desperation. The wife walks out, refusing to be 'Kali ni Rani', the third card in his gamble. Both Chandra Shrimali and Jasumati Parmar reinforce the double oppression of a dalit woman.
II Literature of Protest
Protest literature, notes Digish Mehta (1989:79) has a, "a referential load: it implies a content which is specific, being grounded in history. When expressed in a literary mode, it seeks to elicit a response of a specific kind; the bias is empirical and it points, beyond the aesthetic plane, to the plane of praxis or action." The argument for privileging a 'plane of praxis' over an 'aesthetic plane' has implications for the production, reception as well assessment of dalit literature. To put it clearly, it serves not to ask whether dalit short stories discussed above satisfy literary needs, because literary parameters are inadequate for investigating dalit literature. In an introduction to the Indian short story, Mohan Ramnan talks of the multiple influences at work on the Indian short story, so that an Indian author is exposed not only to English, but also to Irish, French, Russian. He further talks of the disruption of linear strategies in the Indian short story and the prevalence of modernist features such as fantasy and magic realism [Ramnan 2000]. These questions when applied to dalit short stories, lose their significance because they assume a fully literate society. Digish Mehta reminds us: "Discussions on the distinction between 'literary' and 'non-literary' texts originating from the west, usually assume the background of a fully literate society. .". He adds, "A writer who seeks to give literary expression to a sense of resentment or protest against oppression would, in this context, adopt either of two courses available to him: (a) he would work within the literary tradition and would adapt or exploit, with whatever degree of success, the stylistic and other devices made available to him; and (b) he will recoil, as the dalit writer does, from the whole area marked 'literary' and will fall back on 'writing' in the raw, primary sense taking recourse to oral and non-standardised forms of speech, and to forms.the choice of the mode of writing will itself constitute a gesture of protest" [Mehta 1989:84]. Thus any literary investigation has its explanation in the social history of the dalits and therefore tools of literary assessment with regard to dalit literature become irrelevant. At the same time, admittedly, some 'absences' continue to assail this reader and in the discussion that follows an attempt will be made to seek explanations in a context other than the aesthetic one. To begin with, if protest literature is 'grounded in history', why is the treatment of an oppressor and oppressed in Gujarati dalit short stories ahistorical? Why is a patel or darbar in one story indistinguishable from another in a different story? Why is every dalit equally good and naive, without any mechanisms of circumvention or resistance? Is the oppressive 'other' always without and never within? Oppression, as it obtains now in Gujarati dalit short story, is defined in a unilinear fashion, its psychological and social mapping fixed. It flows from the oppressor and moves towards the oppressed. The point is what happens to state and cultural apparatus that solidifies the nature of oppression? The investigation of these questions and problems must take us into non-literary contexts. The unhistorical treatment is a re-enactment of the archetypal struggle between good and evil, central to Hindu mythology and many indigenous traditions. The lack of historicisation may also have to do with the imperatives of a communitarian discourse. A dalit writer, avowedly, speaks not as an individual, but as a member of a community and must therefore, avoid individuated expression. Individuated treatment makes for subtlety and complexity, but runs counter to larger needs of a community. The questions take us into the 'sociology' of dalit literature, which according to Manilal Patel (dalit critic), is a meaningful way of examining dalit literature [Patel 1999:25]. The section that follows turns to an examination of non/emerging sociological contexts or signs of social activity underlying Gujarati dalit short story.
III Understanding Contexts
An application of the tool of sociology involves moving out of the physical text, and into surplus contexts of demography, class, community and gender. The first area of consideration in this regard is the demographic account of the Gujarati dalits. A large population of dalits lives in the rural parts of Gujarat and faces rampant discrimination even today. Studies of discrimination practices by Gaurang Jani (1997) reveal that entry into temples and participation in community meals still occlude the dalits. The segregation of dalits on the basis of purity-pollution ideology is very high in villages and the rise of Hindutva has further reinforced it. At the same time, the Census of 1991 reports that the rates of literacy (not education) among the dalits are equal to those in the mainstream [Yagnik 1997]. The democratisation of education is far from complete and its recipients have been a select few, but it has created a small albeit strong dalit urban, middle class, especially the post-Mandal elite. If the striking feature of the 19th century sociology was the rise of the brahmin elite, in the 20th century it is the formation of the dalit middle class. The existence of this dalit middle class is not an unmixed blessing. It is torn by the desire to erase its humiliating past and the duty to assert it. It is a product of emancipation through education and affirmative action, and is therefore inserted to a certain extent, in the state polity. At the same time, social dignity and material comforts long overdue have come to it at the cost of severing ties with the past. As a consequence, the urban dalit middle class suffers from a strong crisis of identity [Yagnik 1997:35]. As an individual a dalit would much rather erase his past. The change of name, profession and assimilation into a middle class ethos are signs of that erasure. On the other hand, as a member of a community that has to maintain its 'difference' from a homogenising brahminic ethos, he must retain links with its past and identity. Dissociation from the community results in non-participation in building an infrastructure for other suffering members of the dalit community. Gopal Guru points out this difference between dalit in pursuit of modernity (individualistic, antigroupal) and dalit activists committed to intra-group unity [Guru 2000:131]. The burden of my argument here is that the Gujarat dalit short story rarely mirrors the dalit middle class, a very crucial segment in dalit sociology. It was mentioned earlier that the anti-reservation riots in the early 1980s formed a backdrop for the dalit literary movement. The anti-reservation agitation was essentially an urban movement focusing upon the economic implications and cut-down in employment for the upper castes. Ironically, very few dalit short stories grapple with this theme. All this points to an absence of issues concerning an urban dalit in Gujarat and begs many questions to which there cannot be clear-cut answers: Does an urban dalit elide over his 'nuclear' and urban identity in literature? Does the need to 'represent' and speak for/with his community make it imperative to affiliate with a rural, feudal history of anger? If the stuff of an urban dalit's life's not mirrored in his literary preoccupations, what gives rise to that dichotomy and what sustains it? These questions are vexing and wrestling with them is a painful process. The sociological shift from rural to urban has attendant problems of identity which is fraught with contradictions - mirroring the urban sociology in Gujarati dalit literature perhaps also means resolving the contradictions. On the other hand, Marathi dalit short story does reflect this 'ambivalent crisis of identity in a middle class dalit', [Dangle 1992]. Gujarati dalit short story has yet to do so.
Apart from the dalit urban middle class, the story of Gujarati dalit short story is that of many absences. It suffers from lop-sided representation, since only a couple of dalit communities 'represent' a much larger and heterogenous mix of dalit sub-communities. The agency of representation rests chiefly with the vankar community which forms about 50 per cent of the entire dalit population in Gujarat. To a lesser extent, the community of garodas also figures in literary and political movement. It is important to historicise briefly the formation of the vankar community in order to perceive the contexts that make representation possible. The vankars in addition to being a majority, have had the benefits of education and social mobility. Weavers by profession, they were the first one to move from a tradition-bound village life to the textile mills of Ahmedabad during the terrible drought of 1900, known as the 'chhapaniyo dukaal'. Not all forms of migration led to a better and improved quality of life and a large number spent their lives in unhygienic urban ghettoes/chawls. At the same time, it has caused over generations, a background of life in the cities and distance from feudal order of the villages. Add to this the fact that conversion to Christianity is also the highest among the vankars [Ramanathan 2000:64]. The benefits of education and an alternative 'caste-free' religion has given the Gujarati vankars confidence, faith and an improved quality of life.
Ramanathan notes that, "From the psychological point of view, conversion has divergent effects. When adoption of a new religion provides satisfaction of material and psychic needs which affiliation to the older religion could not give, it seems to strengthen faith, and consequently, identity" [Ramanathan 2000:65]. The largest number of Gujarati dalit authors is from the vankar community of which some are Christians. At this point it must be noted that Christian dalit authors map their literary worlds as pre-Christian, Hindu ones. With the exception of Joseph Macwan, we do not find any Christian characters or ways of life being explored in Gujarati dalit short story. Once again, this can be put down to a dalit author's imperative to affiliate with a communal identity rather than a religious one in order to strengthen the dalit movement. To come back to the question of representation, we notice preponderance of a couple of communities for in dalit literature and for various historical reasons, other communities fall outside the fold of representation. The well known writer Joseph Macwan notes that "the tooris, vaghris, ravalias have all suffered, just as we have, if not more. We must encourage them to write, and till they do, we must speak for them." Discrimination and untouchability form the bottom-line of all dalit expressions, at the same the degree and specificities differ and these do not get reflected in the dalit short stories today. The toories and tagaras are conspicuous by their absence, since the fruits of education and literature are still far-fetched dreams for them. On the other hand, education and consequent agency of representation alone is not likely to result in uniformity of response to the dalit question. The internal hierarchies within the dalit system also constitute an uncharted terrain as far as dalit literature is concerned.
Another problematic absence in the corpus of Gujarati dalit short story is that of women writers. The two women writers mentioned earlier, Chandraben Shrimali and Jasumati Parmar are both from the subcommunities of garoda (the 'upper most' layer of brahmins among dalits) and vankar respectively. This in itself explains their presence and the absence of many others who could have come from less privileged communities. The absence of women writers has occluded forms of discrimination other than sexual exploitation. The double burden of being a woman and an untouchable creates its own specific version of oppression, the depiction of which is missing in the corpus of stories today. The violence within a family, the structures of patriarchy, the responses of dalit men to normative codes of brahminism are constantly papered over by male voices, thereby creating a further imbalance of representation. The apparatus of selecting, printing, publishing, disseminating also lie with the male dalit writers and Chandraben perceives patriarchy within the system as a major stumbling block.
It can be concluded from the foregoing that the literary-social-political body of dalit short stories is rife with inequalities and anomalies of representation. There are a number of 'absences' and explanations to those can be sought not in the 'aesthetics vs, ideology' paradigm but in social history. As decades move, different emphases must take over in Gujarati dalit short story and the paradigm of 'oppressor vs oppressed' will have to be shed to accommodate lived realities. This may also lead to a redefinition and readjustment of the dalit aesthetic. After all, will a dalit writer be able to employ a rural locale and dialect in order to communicate a more urban ethos? Will the emerging generations of the urban dalit have an access to the community life? On the other hand, is the elision of his contemporary present an indication of a dalit writer's refusal to relocate his identity in a different time and place and consequently, reshape the aesthetic? When faced with dominant literary parameters of a brahminic culture, is it not imperative for a dalit writer to assert himself through his specific locale and language? These questions have no clear-cut answers, but constitute further areas of reflection in dalit literature.

                                                        References

Dangle, Arjun (1992); Introduction, Poisoned Bread, Orient Longman.
Guru, Gopal (2000): 'Dalits in Pursuit of Modernity', India: Another Millennium? (ed), Romila Thapar, Viking, pp 123-137.
Jani, Gaurang (1997): 'Dalito na Prashno: Sarvekshan na Anubhavo' (Dalit issues: Survey findings) Vacha, 2: pp 19-22.
Mehta, Digish (1989): 'Differing Contexts: The Theme of Oppression in Indian Literatures' New Comparison, 7, pp 79-87.
Patel, Manilal (1999): 'Gujarat Dalit Sahitya: Ketlak Sanketo' (Gujarati Dalit Literature: Some Indications) Hayati, 2, pp 24-29.
Patel, Neerav (1999): 'The Lead Melts at Severed Tongues Find Voice: Emerges Gujarati Dalit Novel' Lecture presented at A National Seminar, Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi, 26-28 February.
Ramanathan, Suguna (2000): 'Impact of Conversions on Dalit Identity' Social Action, January-March.
Ramnan, Mohan (2000): Introduction, English and the Indian Short Story (eds), Mohan Ramnan and P, Sailaja, Orient Longman.
Yagnik, Achyut (1997): 'Dalit Asmita ni Khoj Maan' (In Search of a Dalit Identity) Vacha, 2, 34-57.

AMBEDKARIAN PERSPECTIVE FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT



                       AMBEDKARIAN PERSPECTIVE FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Introduction:
India‟s economic growth rate is running very fast most of the macro indicators look 
positive. Such as (GDP) Gross Domestic Product is approaching to 10 percent, Foreign 
Direct Investment (FDI) is increased a record high, capital market is also moving to 
upward direction. Real estate demand for flats and land shows growing fast at high rate. 
Demand for car is also increasing from rich class. All this shows that people‟s purchasing 
power have been increased. But this only half side story the other side shows us that, 26 
percent people are living below the poverty line and near about 50 percent people are just 
struggling to survive on poverty line. Therefore, it is clear that only 24 percent people are 
sharing the national economic growth. Depressed classes SC, ST and OBC and 
Minorities have strong feelings that they are being excluded from the process of 
economic growth and they are denied their share in national income. So they oppose New 
Economic Policy at large extent. Since the beginning of NEP 1991 Government of India, 
continuously reducing its share from the public sector industries. It creates number of 
issues related to the life of depressed classes as the issues of unemployment and 
uncertainty. It was told that government will increase the expenditure on social over 
heads particularly education and health. However, government data shows that this is not 
happening. On the contrary government expenditure on social over head is grossly 
inadequate to the needs. Therefore, it creates income and wealth inequality, unethical 
activities, demoralizing the youths, violation etc. This is surely not good for long term 
smooth economic development of any country. We believe that Dr. Babasaheb 
Ambedkar‟s economic philosophy focuses on the golden path of development. His 
philosophy maintains that balance in both the sectors public and private systematically. 

Therefore, this is the need of the time to study and understand Dr. Babasaheb 
Ambedkar‟s economic philosophy for the better future of India.

State’s Role in Democratic Society: 

Ambedkar believed that, State can play important role in economic development of 
people. His book “States and Minorities”, this was as much an economic manifesto as a 
social one. It proposed a united Sates of India without right of secession. It called for 
separate electorates, separate village settlements and strong measures against social 
boycott of untouchable and put forth a program for what Ambedkar called „State 
Socialism‟, the nationalization of basic industries, and the nationalization of land and its 
organization in collectives2
. Therefore, under the States Socialism following principles 
will be followed.
a) Active role of state in the planning of economic life of people
b) Emphasis on increase the productivity and production by providing physical 
capital and Human capital
c) Freedom to private sector to plan and manage their industries and trade except in 
selected areas
d) Equitable distribution of National wealth and income among all sections of 
society irrespective of castes, creed, gender, region and religions.
India being inequitably graded society Dr. Ambedkar recognized the need for a three fold 
strategy: 
a) Provision of equal rights (overturning the customary framework of caste system 
based on principle of equality and denial of equal rights, particularly, to 
untouchables).
b) Provision of legal safeguards against the violation of these rights in terms of 
laws.,
c) Pro-active measures against discrimination for fair share and participation in 
legislature, executive, public services, education and other public spheres for 
discriminated groups (in the form of reservation)

In his views, the real solution lies in removing the structural inequalities caused by past 
exclusion and isolation in more fundamental ways and put forward the policy of 
structural equalization3
. It was necessary because of Hindu Social Order which is 
responsible for unequal distribution of National Wealth in India. Accordingly shudras 
were not allowed to acquire any sort of property such as land, fixed capital assets or a 
gainful trade. Therefore, to restructure the Indian society based on Liberty, Equality, 
Justice and Fraternity Dr. Ambedkar suggested some of the very important measures; one 
of them is Nationalization of land. In his important book “States and Minorities” he has 
given a complete plan. How to implement his plan in modern time and what are the 
advantages. ? Let us discuss in brief. The first thesis of Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar on 
agriculture problem namely “Small Holdings and Their Remedies”(1918) he rightly 
points out that the low productivity and production of agriculture sector was due to lack 
of inadequate inputs available to producers and non availability of alternative jobs to 
laborers there is a high presser of excesses labor force on agriculture sector. Therefore he 
has suggested increasing the industrial base to absorb these surplus labors. He also 
demands the abolition of Khoti land holding system to protect the tenant from Khots 
suppression and exploitation in 1937. However, Dr Ambedkar knew that such measures 
will not solve the root cause of sorrow of landless labors and small and marginal farmers. 
So, in 1946 he demands collective methods of cultivation. There are number of 
advantages of collective farming for our understanding we can classify these in two part 
as follows. 

Economic advantages 

a) Total production and productivity will increase due to plan production and 
available of inputs such as fertilizers, capital, equipments and skill workers, and 
those who will work in agriculture sector will get all benefits as other workers in 
industrial sector. 
b) Maximum utilization of available land 
c) Irrigation facilities to all farmers 
d) Use of modern technology at a large extent.


Social advantages

a) Social harmony will prevail, scheduled castes and scheduled tribes and other land 
less workers will not be exploited by land lords. 
b) Justice and equity will remain maintained in rural India.
c) Mobility of surplus labor force from agriculture to industry sector will increase at 
large extent. 
d) Income inequalities and social conflicts will reduce.
These are some of the important advantages of nationalization of land in India. 
Therefore, this is the issue that Ambedkarin thinkers should have to take at fore front 
at their movements. If the policy makers of this country would have accepted the 
demand of Dr. Ambedkar well in advance to nationalize the agriculture and 
reorganized the agriculture sector then such recent suicide of farmers in Maharastra 
would not have been incurred. 
The another important source of capital assets accumulation is industries, therefore 
Dr. Ambedkar suggested that key industries should nationalize. This was reflected in 
the industrial policy of India, as per the industrial resolution of 1956 major industries 
were nationalized. However, since the beginnings of new economic policy in 1991, 
government of India is gradually reducing its share from these industries and 
transferring these industries to the private sector. The results of such unethical 
transfers are multiple and most of these results are affected adversely on the life of 
depressed classes particularly, in respect of employment. These industries are now 
restructuring the pattern of production to increase the level of profit. To earn the 
profits is not a crime itself but if it is earned by reducing the employment then it 
becomes serious concern to Dalits as they have no other alternative source of 
livelihood. Economic times of India recently published a report of one of the expert 
committee on the share of employee‟s in the total production. According their report 
the share of labors in total industrial product in 1990-91 was 11 per cent and in 2000-
01 the labors share reduced to 5.6 per cent .it indicate that though the industrial 
production is increasing but the labors share is decreasing


Government Expenditure on Education and Health 

Education play very important role in the processes of development. Dr Ambedkar 
considered education as most powerful agent for bringing about desired changes in 
society and a it is a prerequisite for organized effort for launching any social 
movement in the modern times. For him education was an instrument to liberate the 
masses from illiteracy, ignorance and superstitious and thus enable them to fight 
against all form of injustice, exploitation and oppression. Therefore, he gave the 
highest priority to education in his struggle for the liberation of dalits from the age 
old oppressive character of the caste ridden Indian society. Being the main architect 
of the Indian Constitution Dr Ambedkar impose the responsibility of providing 
education to all citizens irrespective of caste and gender on government. The Fathers 
of the Constitution of India decided that education should be available free of charge 
and that attendance in schools should be compulsory for all children up to the age of 
14 years as incorporated in Article 45 of the Directive Principles of State policy. This 
provision in Article 45 of the Directive principles of State policy reinforces Article 24 
which reads “no child below the age of 14 years shall be employed to work in any 
factory mine or engaged in any hazardous employment. The Constitution also directs 
that children cannot be abused or forced to work and to enter avocations unsuited to 
their age or strength” through article 39(e) and (f).
Keeping in mind the need to combat the educational and economic disadvantage of 
scheduled castes and scheduled tribes along with other disadvantaged sections of 
society in the past, special emphasis was given to their needs in article 46. This article 
makes a commitment to protect these groups from social injustice and all forms of 
exploitation. All the above provision indicates a clear commitment to giving Indian
children in this freedom and dignity and recognizing their essential contribution to 
building a democratic nation.4 However, the proportion of public outlays that goes to 
finance the education sector is indicative of relative importance assigned to that 
sector. While these figures are indicative of the relative lack of public commitment to 
developing the education system, education is being increasingly looked on as a

„market‟ for major national and multi-national corporations. Where, immense profits 
are to be made instead of public service5
. Social investments are required for 
sustained economic growth. In China public spending on education is 2.3 percent of 
GDP while that on health is 2.1 percent GDP. The outcomes for human development 
are clear. Literacy stands at 84 percent, infant mortality rate at 32 per 1000 live births 
and under five mortality rates at 40 per 1000 live births. 
India, in contrast, has traditionally had lower spending levels. Health spending stands 
at 1.3 percent of GDP (Central and States Governments combined). Spending on 
education has increased significantly, from 0.8 percent of GDP in 1950 to 3.2 percent 
in 2003, though it still falls short of the government target of 6 percent of GDP. 
Human development indicators for India remain much lower than for China. Literacy 
stands at 65 percent, infant mortality at 68 per 1000 live birth, and under five 
mortality rates at 96 per 1000 live births6
. Dr Ambedkar vehemently critics the 
British Government fiscal policy for impoverished India through irrational taxation 
methods, through a land tax that prevented agricultural prosperity and heavy customs 
at internal excise duties that injured its industry. It was clear, he argued, that the 
British government was running India in the interest of British manufacturers.
Similarly, he criticized the British government„s expenditure policy because most of 
the expenditure was on defence, administration and other non- development work and 
grossly neglect social sector particularly education and health.
After independence it was told by the authorities at that time that Indian Government 
will spend more money eradication poverty, education to all and health facilities at 
low cost or free to the poor, employment generation and number of other promises

were given to Indian people. Therefore let us see the educational condition of 
scheduled castes and scheduled tribes in India. 

Educational Conditions SC/ST 

Basic education continues to remain a privilege enjoyed by some and there is 
tremendous variation among the social groups. Universal primary schooling is still a 
distant goal, particularly for females amongst the socially disadvantaged groups, ie 
the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes and other backward castes and Muslim in 
remote rural areas and urban slums. As per the report of ministry of HRD government 
of India 1998-99 the literacy level among the SC females was 23.76 and foe ST 
females it was 19.18 and for others 44.81 percent and male literacy rate was 49.91 for 
SC and 40.65 for ST and 69.53 for others. It shows the literacy disparity and urgency 
to take steps to spread the education among the SC/ST. further if we observed the 
rural areas literacy rate then the condition is worst. Literacy rate among the sc 
females in rural areas shows that 19.46 percent and for st 16.02 and for other 35.38. 
With such a vast illiteracy how can we compete with the global economy and what 
will be the position of dalits . Therefore, a firm commitment to the widespread and 
equitable provision of basic education is the first requirement of rapid progress in 
eradicating educational deprivation in India. Low levels of education in India reflect 
both the low duration of schooling for children who are enrolled at some stage and a 
large proportion of children are never enrolled at all7
. This is not the only story of 
India, but the scared resources are also spent disproportionately as more on higher 
education and less on primary education. The result of such spending is that , those 
who are already educated they get more benefits of government‟s expenditure policy 
on education and those who are disadvantaged people they are affected adversely. So, 
it is clear that, relatively well to do class get better advantages of government‟s 
expenditure policy on education than disadvantaged classes.

Similar position is for health expenditure of government of India last year‟s budgetary 
provision for health services was 0.95 percent of union budget. Therefore, public 
hospitals do not have adequate medicine in the hospital and poor people are dying 
without basic health facilities. Why this is happening in India after 60 years of 
independence. 
Remedial measures:
If we think deeply we get sources of pitiable conditions of depressed classes in 
modern India. India experienced many political changes after independence. 
However, the basic organization and structure of the society has not change. Different 
political parties have formed their government at Centre and States levels such as 
Congress, BJP, Janata Dal, Communist etc but the ruling class remained the same 
from the upper strata of the society ie Brahmins, Baniyas, land Lords and capitalists. 
They are utilizing the political power, administrative powers and judicial powers to 
build up their economic strength and to increase their welfare by adopting policies to 
their favor and to maintain the status as it was in the feudal time.Therefore, most of 
their organizations such as RSS, Bajarang Dal, Shiv Sena etc. they are creating the 
illusions among the Bahujan Samaj on the name of religion, castes , regions and rule 
the masses without interruption . I do not blame them; they are doing it for their 
people‟s welfare and to maintain their supreme power over depressed classes. The 
question before me is what depressed classes should do. This is the important 
question before us. I think we have to divide our objective in two parts, the first part 
deals with short term objectives and second part deals with long term objectives. 
Short Terms Objectives: 
a) Welfare policies of government: we have to see that welfare policies of
government should be implemented timely and properly. These include education 
policy, health and family welfare policies.
b) Infrastructure facilities: we have to observe that government spent on 
infrastructure such as sanitation facilities, roads, electricity, safety for life, it help 
indirectly to poor to boosts their energy.
c) Allocation of funds: we have to see that allocated funds are not diverted to ulterior 
motive by the vested interest people. 

d) Monitoring the scheme : government should appoint a permanent monitoring 
body to see that there is no mismanagement , or Dalits among them selves should 
creates an organization to monitor the scheme. These monitors will organize 
regular awareness programs among the marginalized people and will give the 
detailed information about the government welfare schemes. 
e) To built up educational trust or societies for spreading education among them. 
Similarly create awareness about Human Rights. Find out the sources and make them 
available of legal information, the rights of livelihood towards the government, and 
other public authorities. Develop the entrepreneurial abilities and provide adequate 
facilities to dalits. 
Long term programs: 
The long term objective of depressed classes is to total transformation the existent 
structure of society.
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar said that, until we get political power in our hands we can 
not the existing oppressive system.
a) To capture the political power we have to remove the illusion from the mind of 
depressed classes about the concepts of Hindutva and such other type of concepts 
and make them aware about their present positions. 
b) Continuous efforts to minimize the enemies of dalits and make more true friends 
c) To build up strong political organization
d) To reconstruct the Indian society based on freedom, equality, justice and 
fraternity 
The task look difficult but if it plan properly and work together restlessly, I have no 
doubts in my mind that this is not impossible. What Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar 
dreamed New Global India is possible to build up in 21st century.










Thursday, May 9, 2013

SC/STs and the State in the Indian Constitution


                                         SC/STs and the State in the Indian Constitution



At the outset let me thank Dr BR Ambedkar Research and Extension Center and University of
Mysore for doing me the honour by inviting to deliver this special lecture on the Republic Day.
We generally choose problematical themes for such lectures. By that logic, the theme formulated
by the organizers implicitly suggest some problematic. I am not sure to what extent you are
aware of it, but I am acutely concerned with the problematic associated with all the three
constituent elements of this theme. This day 62 years ago we, as the people of India adopted our
Constitution to give ourselves a republic. The Constitution has been eulogized as one of the
finest constitutions in the world, particularly for its elaborate handling of social justice. Because
it took exceptional note of the people called SC/STs and provided them with protective,
promotional and developmental care. It was expected that a plethora of measures devised for it
would bring them on par with others in course of some time. Indeed it did so, but to a tiny
section of them and unleashed the dynamics that has already aggravated the divide existing
among these communities. Its republican vision promising people secularism, socialism and
democracy is already marred by the consistent antithetical experiences. Over the years the state,
which is constitutionally mandated to be in service of people has only shown its fangs to the
latter. If they are poorer, it bites them; to Dalits, it bites most. The state which was to protect the
SC/STs has become the chief tormentor of them.
This is the most bewildering picture of performance of our Constitution over the last six years.
There is this commonplace notion that our Constitution is good but the people who are
implementing it are a bad lot. There may be some truth in it but certainly not the complete truth.
After all it is the precise role of the Constitution to make the bad lot behave; it the people are
good, there perhaps is no need of any Constitution. By the dictum that the test of pudding is in its
eating, we may have to problematize even our Constitution for the consistently bad results being
produced under its regime. Indeed, we have to problematize everything, all holy cows around us, perhaps in an Ambedkarite
iconoclastic way, to see where the rot lies. That is what precisely I intend doing in brief over the
next hour or so.
Making of the SC/STs
Foremost, it is necessary to understand that SC/STs are the administrative identities and they do
not correspond to social reality. They were born during colonial times in the process of political
reforms towards giving India a responsible self-government. The Morley-Minto Reforms Report,
Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms Report, and the Simon Commission Report were some of the
initiatives that can be directly associated with this context. One of the hotly contested issues in
the proposed reforms was the topic of reservation of seats for the “Depressed Classes”1
 in
provincial and central legislatures. In 1935 the British passed the Government of India Act 1935,
giving Indian provinces greater self-rule within a national federal structure and incorporated in it
the reservation of seats for the Depressed Classes. The Act brought the term “Scheduled Castes”
into use, and defined it as “such castes, races or tribes or parts of groups within castes, races or
tribes, which appear to His Majesty in Council to correspond to the classes of persons formerly
known as the ‘Depressed Classes’. The Government of India (Scheduled Castes) Order, 1936,
contained a list, or a Schedule, of castes throughout the British administered provinces.2
Some provinces and princely states were already using Depressed Class - lists, mainly for
extending educational concessions. The 1931 census, the Franchise Committee, and the
provincial authorities had deliberated over the matter and came up with somewhat different lists,
which were revised more than once before being finalized in 1935. The Scheduled Castes were
to be the Untouchable Hindu castes, and were defined as “castes, contact with whom entails
purification on the part of high caste Hindus.”3 The Census Commissioner, J. H. Hutton, set forth
nine criteria to determine which castes were to be scheduled. The most important criterion, he
said, was whether the caste suffered (1) civil disabilities like denial of access to roads, wells or
schools. Five more were religious and social criteria: whether the caste (2) caused pollution by
touch or proximity; (3) was denied access to the interior of ordinary Hindu temples; (4) was
denied the services of “clean Brahmans”; or (5) the services of the same barbers, etc., who
served high caste Hindus; and (6) was subject to the rules concerning acceptance of water. These
six criteria were meant to include castes; the remaining three were meant to exclude them: the
caste was not to be scheduled if (7) an educated member was treated as a social equal by a high
caste man of the same education; or if pressed only because of its (8) occupation or (9)
ignorance, illiteracy or poverty, “and but for that would be subject to no social disability.”4
 These
criteria were adopted to prepare the schedule for the castes in 1936.

While these criteria were found generally applicable in many areas, they posed problem in some.
In parts of the South they broke down because there were too many castes that qualified for
inclusion in the schedule. If mechanically done, there would have been huge population of these
parts included in the schedule. Therefore, it was decided to apply additional criteria of illiteracy
and poverty to bring the number down to a reasonable level. In the northernmost provinces an
opposite problem arose. There some castes tended to qualify these criteria but the disabilities
they suffered were milder and variable. Therefore, again these ad hoc secular criteria, illiteracy
and poverty, were applied for inclusion of certain castes in the schedule.
The process of making schedule was disputed by a number of authorities, especially in U.P. and
Bengal, who expressed dissatisfaction mainly because the criteria were social and religious,
which were not construed then as a legitimate concern of the government. Some argued that the
criteria were fictitious and inappropriate to define and list the scheduled castes by their ritual
status. Notwithstanding these objections, the fact remains that the resultant schedule though
based on a well defined criteria was not error free. While it largely included ‘untouchable’
castes, certain castes in South which were considered untouchables and even unseeables got
excluded on adhoc criteria. Surely the castes like Nadars in Tamil Nadu and Ezhavas in Kerala
may have been these excluded castes. What is notable here is the tremendous progress the
Nadars and Ezhavas have made vis-à-vis the castes within the schedule. In view of this
observation, can it be hypothesized that the stigma associated with the Schedule rather than
helping the scheduled caste has proved harmful to their progress? I do not know for sure but the
insight based on these facts is surely plausible and worth exploring.
Whether or not, these excluded castes were technically ‘out castes’, the empirical fact that they
were similarly placed as the untouchable castes that got into the schedule in 1936 but made such
progress that none from the schedule could make, may point to a very disturbing proposition that
the government ‘schedule’ rather than helping the untouchables has harmed them. The possible
reasons may be hypothesized as follows. The practice of untouchability was a fact but as a part
of the life world of people it was hazy and muddled. Inclusion into a schedule, the castes got
official stamping of ritual inferiority and universal stigmatization. The castes that did not get
included into it in corollary escaped it and in course of time even society forgot that they were
untouchables in past. The castes in the schedule on the one hand developed vested interests in
preserving their status and on the other hand became subject to bitterness by the rest of the
society as undeserving beneficiaries. As a result, the schedule blocked the progress of the
scheduled castes whereas the castes outside its pale could progress without this baggage.
There is a scope to speculate that formalization of untouchability through the administration
action could be detrimental to the subjects intended to benefit from it. It may be explained in
terms of self initiative for building up social capital by communities that were excluded from the

schedule, which gets replaced by reliance on the state in communities which were included in the
schedule. The theory of caste as the basis for building social capital got credence by the studies
of some castes like Gounders in Tamil Nadu who created Tirupur as the global center for
knitwear industry.5
 The former communities could benefit even from official upgradation of their
social status widening social spaces for their development. Of course, one has to take into
account the initial endowments of these communities that disqualified them to be in schedule but
propelled them soon on to development path.
After independence, the Constituent Assembly adopted the prevailing definition of Scheduled
Castes. The term “Scheduled Tribe” however did not exist and came into being only after the
Constitution was adopted. The first serious attempt to list these communities as primitive tribes
was made during the census of 1931. In the Government of India Act (1935) a reference was
made to the “Backward Tribes” and again the Thirteenth Schedule to the Government of India
(Provincial Legislative assemblies) Order, 1936 specified certain tribes as backward in the
provinces of Assam, Bihar, Orissa, CP and Berar, Madras and Bombay. In the 1941 census these
people were recorded as “Tribes” and separate totals were furnished only for a few selected
individual tribes.6
 In pursuance of the provisions under the Art 343 of the Constitution, the
president made an order in 1950 specifying certain tribes or tribal communities as scheduled
Tribes and consequently another schedule for the tribes along the lines of scheduled castes was
created. The actual complete listing of castes and tribes was made via two orders The
Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order, 1950, and The Constitution (Scheduled Tribes) Order,
1950 respectively. The criteria followed for the schedule for tribes were: indications of primitive
traits, distinctive culture, geographical isolation, shyness of contact with the community at large,
and backwardness. These criteria were not spelt out in the Constitution but were from the
definition adopted in the 1931 Census. The 1950 schedules listed 1,108 castes across 25 states
and 744 tribes across 22 states.
Unlike the defining criterion of untouchability for the SCs, the criteria for the tribal schedule
were vague which were still diluted for the revision of the list based on the subsequent reports:
the first Backward Class Commission (Kalelkar) 1955, the Advisory Committee on Revision of
SC/ST lists (Lokur Committee) 1965 and the joint committee of parliament on the Scheduled
Castes and Scheduled Tribes Orders (Amendment) Bill, 1967 (Chanda Committee) 1969. The
tribal communities had three divisions: first, those enjoying fairly high status within the Hindu
society, e.g., Raj Gonds – so called because they had actually ruled large tracts in central India;
second, partially Hinduized tribes settled in plains and third, those actually inhabited hill
sections.7
 Moreover, there being no stigma of lowliness attached to the tribes, there was no
reluctance of communities to accept the tag of a scheduled tribe. Resultantly, many relatively
well off communities managed to get into the schedule and deprived the genuine tribes of the
benefits intended for them. These communities (e.g., Meenas in Rajasthan, Halba Koshtis in

Maharashtra and most tribes in North East, which were the ruling tribes in past and today are
well educated and westernized) have dominated the list of STs leaving the needy high and dry.
Making of the India’s Constitution
The long colonial rule had established the benchmark for liberal democratic governance in the
country. Its advent, although with colonial logic, had brought in modern institutions of
administration, justice and liberal ethos and significantly impacted traditional social institutions
in India. Later in response to the freedom struggle, it brought in a sense of self-governance by
partially devolving power to provincial assemblies of peoples’ representatives. The Bolshevik
revolution in Russia in 1917 had opened up new horizons before the world people about the
possibilities of self-governance sans exploitation which created pressure on the ruling classes to
yield grounds. By the end of World War II, when the colonial powers were so weakened that
they were no longer in position to directly govern their colonies, they decided to relinquish
power in favour of a representative body of the local people, but not before ensuring protection
of their long term interests by the new rulers. The liberal democratic model, which appeared to
provide governance by popular will but actually left ample scope for the propertied classes to
maintain their control, had become a default model of governance in the non-communist world
and as such it was adopted by almost all newly freed countries. India was no exception.
When India attained Independence, naturally the options before the ruling classes were limited as
the Congress, their representative body, had been projecting its vision of self rule in response to
the aspirations of people and creating noises that raised them further. Liberal democracy meant
constitutional democracy, the constitution being the rule book for the state, a mechanism of
checks and balances. After the World War II formally ended on 9 May 1945, the Labour
government came to power in July 1945 in the UK. It soon announced its India policy and
initiated a process of transfer of power. The process included convening the constituent assembly
for making the constitution.
Historically speaking, the Constitution evolved through a process which began much earlier than
this, as a part of India’s struggle for independence from British rule. Way back in 1895 the
leaders of India’s freedom struggle (Annie Besant and Lokmanya Tilak) had put forward a
document called Constitution of India Bill, also known as Home Rule Bill, which envisaged
freedom of expression and equality before law for all people. In February 1924 Motilal Nehru
introduced a resolution outlining the procedure for drafting and adopting a Constitution for India
in the Central Legislative Assembly, which had also passed it. In 1927 Lord Birkenhead, the
Secretary of State, challenged Indian leaders “to produce a Constitution which carries behind it a
fair measure of general agreement among different sections”. The Indian National Congress
accepted the challenge and convened an All Parties Conference in 1928 which appointed a
committee under the chairmanship of Motilal Nehru to determine the principles of Constitution

for India. The Nehru Report submitted on 10th August 1928 was in effect an outline of a draft
Constitution of India. It envisaged equal rights to men and women regardless of caste, class,
religion or region, free elementary education, freedom of expression to all, etc. The secular
character of the state was also mentioned as one of its fundamental character. The idea of
framing the Constitution by a Constituent Assembly elected with widest possible franchise, first
propounded by M. N. Roy and Jawaharlal Nehru, began to gain ground. Congress included it in
its election manifesto for 1936-37 elections to provincial legislatures. The British accepted it
only in 1945 after the end of World War II. However, when the Constituent Assembly came to
be formed these ideas were compromised. As an election based on universal adult franchise
would require lot of preparations and time, Congress had to agree to the Cabinet Mission’s
scheme of electing members of the Constituent Assembly by the elected members of provincial
assemblies.
Interestingly, the Constituent Assembly was convoked by the British rulers by executive action
before India’s independence, which even determined its composition. It was the Indian
Independence Act, enacted by the British Parliament on 18 July 1947 that gave
Constitutional sanction to the Indian Constitution in advance of its formulation.8
 The total
membership of the Assembly thus was to be 389. As recommended by the Cabinet Mission,
292 members were elected through the Provincial Legislative Assemblies, 93 members
represented the Indian Princely States and 4 members represented the Chief Commissioners’
Provinces. The Congress working committee made great effort to see the members from the
scheduled castes and Tribes; Women, Christians, Parsis and Anglo-Indians were among the
Congress candidates. Congress won a huge majority of seats in the Constituent Assembly.
Among the elected, majority were the Hindus although Congress had given due
representation to other communities. As to its communal composition, there were 5 Sikhs, 3
Parsees, 7 Christians, 3 Anglo-Indians, 5 Backward Tribes, 31 Muslims and 33 Scheduled
Castes. The caste distribution among the Hindus was: 56 Brahmans, 15 Kayasthas, 11
Vaishnava and Marwaris, 9 Kshatriya and Rajput, 3 Marathas, 3 Reddies, 1 Lingayat and 1
Vokkaliga.9
 There was also an effort to bring in the best available talent irrespective of their
political affiliations and as such there were as many as 30 members who were elected on
Congress ticket but they were not its members.
Initially, the Constituent Assembly was constituted for the united India. Though the Muslim
League had participated in the elections, it boycotted its proceeding to press for its demand for
Pakistan. Ultimately this demand was conceded vide the Mountbatten Plan of partition
announced on 3 June, 1947. Consequently, a separate Constituent Assembly was set up for
Pakistan and representatives of some provinces given to Pakistan ceased to be members of the
Constituent Assembly of India. As a result, the membership of the Assembly was reduced to 299.

The Constitution naturally carried the imprint of the Congress vision articulated through the
freedom struggle as can be seen through various documents. For instance, it carried much of the
content of the Nehru Committee report of 1928 with regard to safeguards relating to fundamental
rights. Ten of their nineteen heads were carried almost unchanged in Part III of the Indian
Constitution and another three appeared as Directive Principles under Part IV. The Nehru
Committee Report was rejected by the Simon Commission of 1927-28 as “abstract declarations”
and so “useless” but its essential demand for individual rights was repeated in the Indian
Independence Resolution of 1930. Although the Government of India Act of 1935, the direct
predecessor of the Indian Constitution, was enacted without any formal bill of rights, it had
safeguards against discrimination in the spheres like employment, owning property, and carrying
on trade or business. Interestingly, what later proved to be the weakest fundamental right—the
right to property—was also included in Section 299. Since the Government of India Act mostly
failed to provide effective remedies against executive despotism, the Congress repeated its
demand for a bill of rights at the Calcutta session of 1937.10 World War II put an end to all such
initiatives, and only the Sapru Committee Report of 1946 demanded fundamental rights as a
necessary standard of conduct for all the organs of state.11 While the Constituent Assembly
picked up the concept of justiciable and non-justiciable rights, propounded in this report, it had
to take refuge in the Irish Constitution to resolve the tension between “individual rights” and
“individual responsibilities or collective rights”. This led to the ultimate adoption of the
justiciable—non-justiciable dichotomy of Parts III and IV of the Constitution.12
While there is no doubt that the Constitution of India is skillfully crafted by the Drafting
Committee into one of the longest and most comprehensive documents in the history of modern
legislature, its content is imbued with the ideological hegemony of the Congress and conditioned
by its class character. On 13 December, 1946, Jawaharlal Nehru moved the Objectives
Resolution, unanimously adopted by the Constituent Assembly on 22 January 1947, which
expressed the aspirations and expectations of the people that they had from independence. The
Resolution inter alia said that the Assembly would declare India as an independent, sovereign
republic; guarantee freedoms of thought, expression, belief, faith and vocation; provide equality
and justice to all citizens; and ensure welfare of various sections of the people. It also made it
clear that ultimate power would reside in people. The Resolution had thus provided a guideline
and a framework for the Constituent Assembly to work out the Constitution. In spite of the
ideological differences, almost all the members of the Constituent Assembly agreed with the
Objective Resolution. The Constitution as it emerged essentially reflected the spirit of the
Objective Resolution. It was quintessentially an exercise in liberal democracy not quite different
from the trend existed then. The most distinguishing part of the Constitution was its elaborate
scheme of social justice, which reflected the strategic realization of the ruling classes to convince
the multitude of have-nots that their interests would be taken care by the Constitutional regime.
Despite Nehru’s much publicized love for socialism, the Constitution avoided to touch the

distributional aspects of the society. The dominant class character of the Constituent Assembly
itself was deterrent enough to guard off any tendency to impart economic character to the
Constitution.
This was briefly exposed by Babasaheb Ambedkar in one of his first speeches in the Constituent
Assembly. He was invited out of turn by the Chairman, Rajendra Prasad to make his observation
in connection with an amendment proposed by MR Jaykar to the Objective Resolution moved by
Jawaharlal Nehru. Dr Ambedkar made a brief speech in the Constituent Assembly on 17
December 1946 wherein he echoed one of the principles propounded in his States and Minorities
for the nationalization of land and industry:
“Sir, there are here certain provisions which speak of justice, economical, social and
political. If this Resolution has a reality behind it and a sincerity, of which I have not
the least doubt, coming as it does from the mover of the Resolution, I should have
expected some provision whereby it would have been possible for the State to make
economic, social and political justice a reality and I should have from that point of view
expected the Resolution to state in most explicit terms that in order that there may be
social and economic justice in the country, that there would be nationalisation of
industry and nationalisation of land, I do not understand how it could be possible for
any future Government which believes in doing justice socially, economically and
politically, unless its economy is a socialistic economy. Therefore, personally, although
I have no objection to the enunciation of these propositions, the Resolution is, to my
mind, somewhat disappointing. I am however prepared to leave this subject where it is
with the observations I have made.”13
It is surprising that while he chose to point out the basic lacunae in the Resolution, he voluntarily
added that he would not insist upon it. As a matter of fact, he would not bring it up ever again in
the constituent assembly. Being totally left out from the political parleys for transfer of power
and without any strength of his party in any provincial assemblies, Babasaheb Ambedkar did not
have any hope of entering the Constituent Assembly. In the circumstance the Scheduled Caste
Federation, his party had decided to submit a memorandum to the Constituent Assembly to be
considered for the future constitution. This memorandum, which had radical provisions for what
is called state socialism (with provisions such as nationalization of land and key and basic
industries; parcelling the lands to village cooperatives with capital being provided by the state,
compulsory insurance to all with the insurance lying in state sector, etc.) was later published in
May 1947 as States and Minorities, with Ambedkar’s preface dated 15 March 1947. While there
was no possibility of such a radical plan being adopted through the legislative process, why
Babasaheb Ambedkar should make it in the first place and still not even mention it shall remain a
mystery!

When the Constitution was being framed India presented an impossible picture of fragmented
polity: it was befogged with the communal divide between Muslims and Hindus, was faced with
integration problems of 565 princely states, communist led peasant struggles with all potential to
flare up into a conflagration, in addition to pulls and pushes from numerous castes, communities,
linguistic and cultural groups. But the biggest long term threat was from its organic proletariat
comprising one-sixth population which was totally excluded on account of the caste system.
Although fragmented into castes, this huge mass of proletariat could turn into a veritable volcano
with a spark of class consciousness. It was therefore necessary for the ruling classes to devise
suitable containment policy such that it would neutralize this threat and still not compromise any
of its class interests. The Constituent Assembly while proclaiming equality skilfully kept castes,
the most menacing contrivance of inequality, untouched. It banished untouchability but not caste,
its source. The alibi was to use caste to extend social justice to the caste-oppressed groups like
SCs.
The real objective was to keep the proletariat caste bound so as to insure that they never realize
their class status. The second objective was to keep them bound within the constitutional system.
This dual objective was achieved through a plethora of constitutional provisions in their favour.
Since they had existed in some form during the colonial times, it was easy for the constituent
assembly to continue them. The task was rather to rationalize and enhance them. It is interesting
that there was a kind of unanimity about these provisions in the Constituent Assembly. These
provisions fall under the following three spheres:
1. Protective Measures - Such measures as are required to enforce equality, to provide
punitive measures for transgressions, to eliminate established practices that perpetuate
inequities, etc. (Article 17). A number of laws were enacted to operationalize the
provisions in the Constitution, such as Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955 and the
Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocity) Act, 1989, the
Employment of Manual Scavengers and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act,
1993 and the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis Act, 1993, etc.
2. Promotional Measures (affirmative action) - provides preferential treatment (reservation)
in allotment of jobs and access to higher education, as a means to accelerate the
integration of the SC/STs with mainstream society. Some of the constitutional provisions
are: Article 46: Promotion of educational and economic interests. Article 16 and 335:
Preferential treatment in matters of employment in public services. Article 330 and 332:
Reservation of seats in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies. The general rule which
exempted the scientific and technical posts from the purview of positive discrimination
was applicable to the autonomous bodies too.14

3. Developmental Measures - Provides for resources and benefits to bridge the wide gap in
social and economic condition between the SC/STs and other communities. Under it
numerous measures can be counted such as freeships to the students to the special
component plan.
Generally, Babasaheb Ambedkar is acknowledged as the chief architect of the Constitution.
While it is true that he had borne much of the load of drafting the contentious clauses and
piloting them in the constituent assembly and making it one of the most comprehensive
legislative documents in the world, he should not be held responsible for its contents. Even going
metaphorically, the architect does not own up the vision or the content of the house; he merely
shapes it up with his skills and knowledge. The constitutional contents were predominantly
calibrated by the strategy of the class of emergent bourgeoisie, expressed through their
representative party--the Congress. While this strategy was enabled by the framework of liberal
democracy, based on the representative structure, it would not be good enough to insure the buy
in of the depressed classes. The colonial regime, with its own logic, had already introduced many
measures for their development. While there was no option to rethink them, mere continuation of
them also would not suffice in view of the rising aspirations of people in general. If these classes
of organic proletariats were not duly accommodated, they could pose biggest threat to the
structure in course of time. None other than Mahatma Gandhi, the strategist extraordinaire of the
Congress was acutely aware of it. Although he couched his arguments in moralistic terms, they
were basically driven by this strategic necessity. It was the masterstroke of his strategy to get Dr
Ambedkar elected to the Constituent Assembly, when his membership was annulled as a result
of the partition Plan in June, 1947, and then to make him the chairman of its most important
committee, the Drafting committee. He knew there was little that Dr Amabekar could do but
would contribute immensely in rationalizing the contents the Congress decided and defend it in
the constituent assembly with his intellectual prowess and erudition. More than his scholarship
and intellectual prowess, he wanted Ambedkar’s name to go as the creator of the constitution,
which he saw being crucially important for the downtrodden masses upholding it. The
sentimental manner in which Dalits view and uncritically uphold the Constitution as the creation
of their leader proves the strategist extraordinaire in Gandhi right. Despite Dr Ambedkar’s public
denouncement and disowning statements15
, and their own bitter experience, Dalits would stake
anything to defend the Constitution.
Continuation with the reservation policy for the scheduled castes had an important embedded
opportunity. Insofar as the policy took cognisance of caste, albeit with the veneer of social
justice, the castes would be kept alive. It is a mute point that in the prevailing situation whether
there was any option than making exception of scheduled castes for extending constitutional
provisions. Perhaps there wasn’t. But in the policy formulation the same could have been
confined only to the scheduled castes as victims and transformed it into a challenge to the rest of
the society to expiate its crime or in other words the policy could have been termed as the

countervailing measure to make the rest of the society behave by overcoming its disability (and
not that of the scheduled castes) of being incapable of treating its own members equal. What
instead came through the policy was association of secular backwardness with certain castes. The
caste system with its graded inequality caused deprivation or granted privileges in a continuum.
Backwardness therefore could not be theoretically associated only with some castes.
Backwardness as a multi-dimensional outcome moreover cannot be solely attributed to a single
factor like caste. Therefore, prudence demanded that since the scheduled castes were historically
excluded as outcastes and a fairly homogenous people, they could be made an exception purely
for their social treatment resting onus of that on the larger society.
Making of the Indian State
The Indian state was supposed to be based on India’s Constitution. Whatever the limitation of the
Constitution, it was an excellently executed liberal document. It distinguished itself by two
things: its preamble that gave its vision and its section IV which provided the direction to state
policy. The preamble of the Constitution emphasizes its republican character and explicates its
vision to be a perfectly egalitarian society. It says including its amendment:
“We the people of India, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a Sovereign
Socialist Secular Democratic Republic and to secure to all its citizens: Justice, social,
economic and political; Liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship; Equality
of status and of opportunity; and to promote among them all Fraternity assuring the
dignity of individuals and the unity and integrity of the Nation.”
And the Directive Principles of State Policy outlines measures the state should incorporate into
its policies so as to accomplish this lofty vision.
There was no attempt to remodel the state as per the new republican vision. The entire state
machinery was inherited from the colonial regime and continued unchanged. It inherited colonial
bureaucracy, colonial laws, colonial rules, colonial procedures and colonial operative ethos
which were oriented to treat people as subject. With its alien attribution gone off it assumed
rather unimpeded powers over people and behaved as such. In effect, it proved perfect antithesis
of the Constitutional vision. The duality of the Indian constitution and the state replicated the
traditional doublespeak of the Indian ruling classes. While the Indian Constitution professed all
liberal ideals in the world, the Indian state supposed to be ordained by this Constitution trampled
them all with impunity and became perfectly illiberal and tormentor of people. The state came
out in its true character which is only noted in the Marxist school. According to Marx, the state is
an organ of class rule, an organ for the oppression of one class by another; it is the creation of
“order”, which legalizes and perpetuates this oppression by moderating the conflict between

classes.16 Muffled by the imperative of long term ruling class interests, the Indian state can be
seen as the veritable exemplar of the Marxian definition.
The translation of the constitutional welfare goals into practice have in fact remained a mere
constitutional chimera being far off even after six decades of independence. Within the existing
socio-politico-economic power structure based on the capitalist model of modernization /
framework of market economy which the democratic and constitutional state of India has
adopted, it has widened sharpened disparities, frustration, estrangement, deprivation,
exploitation, poverty, insecurity, oppression, unemployment, starvation, corruption and injustices
of all sorts, affecting adversely the social, political and economic conditions of the vast majority
of lower strata. The weaker sections are not only deprived of the development programmes in
most cases, they are kept out of development process. Poverty question is a power question; it is
rooted in the model of development that produces it and gets in turn reproduced.
State of the SC/STs
In order to examine the behavior of the state vis-à-vis the constitutional provisions in respect of
the SC/STs, there perhaps is no better way than looking at the outcome over the republican
period under three spheres of constitutional policies as outlined above.
Protective Measures
The caste system was based on the notions of purity and pollution supposedly based on Hindu
scriptures. But it is grossly erroneous to treat contemporary castes as the same. The operation of
castes today is a combination of several factors possibly unconnected with any scriptural dictum
of purity and pollution. The Constitution has banished untouchability as crime and law was
enacted to deal with it. But the state willed otherwise and the untouchability is still rampantly
practiced all over. Many surveys such as various state level surveys during 1990s, Action Aid
Survey of 565 villages in 11 states in 2001-200217 and the recent survey of 1589 villages in
Gujarat by Navasarjan Trust and Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights18 survey
have clearly found the instances of untouchability being practiced to a significant extent. The
infamous two tumbler system is still extant in some parts of south India. It is not the matter with
the backward parts, even in the capitalist Punjab and Haryana the practice is encountered. If one
equates untouchability with the discriminating attitude, it prevails everywhere, even in the most
globalized sectors of India in the metropolis.
The most concrete manifestation of castes however is caste atrocities. The atrocities are arguably
the best proxy for casteism. The government has developed a good system of compiling data on
caste atrocities with neat classification, which makes them amenable to statistical analysis. Caste
atrocities like castes are not based on scriptural notion but have to do with the changes in power

relations in the countryside, the terrain where they happen. The data on atrocities show a drastic
change since late 1960s in quantitative as well as qualitative terms. The atrocities until then
happened at individual level, both on victim as well as perpetrator side. But later they
increasingly started happening in collective mode—many people coming and attacking a group
of Dalits in a very planned and calculated manner so as to teach the entire dalit community a
lesson. Kilvenmani in Tamil Nadu marks the beginning of this new genre of atrocities. It took
place in the context of agriculture wage struggle led by the Communist party, in which the
landlords attacked the entire Dalit locality and burnt some 44 people, mainly women and
children alive on 25 December 1968. A spate of atrocities followed thereafter everywhere and
flared up in Bihar in 1980s into a virtual caste war. All these atrocities are explained by the
changes in political economy and not on the basis of any scriptural basis.
If one analyzed this phenomenon carefully one would find that the state policy has directly is at
its root. The so called Nehruvian modernization project undertaken immediately after the
independence, marked mainly by the land reforms followed by the Green Revolution pushed out
the traditional upper caste landlords from villages and created in their place a class of rich
farmers in villages from among the Shudra castes. It transformed traditional production relations
into capitalist relations by creating input, output, credit, implements, and labour markets in
villages. Consequently, it uprooted the old jajmani relations signifying the interdependence of
castes, reducing Dalits as landless labourers dependent on the farm wages from the Shudra caste
farmers. The economic contradiction between labour and capital, the social contradiction
between the outcaste and caste, accentuated by the cultural assertion of dalits and political
ascendance of the Shudra castes but their relative lack of cultural sophistication (compared to the
traditional upper castes) began manifesting into clashes expressed through the familiar faultlines
of castes. This perplexing phenomenon of rising casteism with the spread of capitalism can be
explained by the inverse developmental relation between the state and class in India: while
elsewhere the emergent class of bourgeoisie created their state, in India it is the state that created
the capitalist class. As a result, the creolized class that came into existence would pursue his
accumulation objective without discarding its previous feudal advantages.
Alarmed by the rising incidence of atrocities the state enacted supposedly a stringent Act in the
form of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989. But even
it proved useless in preventing atrocities. The next fillip to the atrocities came since 1990s, with
the next wave of change in the economy. This wave was marked by the advent of neoliberal
reforms, popularly called globalization. These reforms through their multidimensional operations
created crisis in countryside (best manifested by the alarming incidence of farmers’ suicides),
which began manifesting into atrocities. There has been a consistent rise in atrocity statistics
since 1990s in absolute number as well as in the intensity of atrocities represented by more
serious kinds such as rapes and murders. The phenomenon may be explained by the general

crisis in the middle level of agriculturists and relatively stable economic condition of Dalits
coupled with their rising cultural assertion. It is not that Dalits are not affected adversely by these
reforms but as the lot without stake could take any job in growing informal sector and look
relatively well off. It has thus accentuated the existing power asymmetry leading to caste
atrocities. My book on Khairlanji19 has explained these processes in greater details.
There are still heinous practices of manual scavenging extant despite there being a specific law
to curb it. The Employment of Manual Scavengers and Construction of Dry Latrines
(Prohibition) Act, 1993 has been totally ineffective because of the indifferent attitude of the state
machinery. Last year the Savanur20 and Gulbarga21 incidents in your own state itself have
effectively brought these facts to limelight.
With regard to dealing with the caste atrocities, the record as commented by many has been
anything than dismal. The police machinery, hand in glove with high caste perpetrators, would
not register the crime; if registered, would not investigate it; if investigated, would not present; if
presented, it would not be pleaded in the courts by prosecution, and ultimately the case will fail.
It is said that only the 10-20 percent of the actual number of atrocities enters the police record
and still the total number of atrocities per year have been hovering above 35,000. The dismal rate
of convictions that has been less than 10 percent until recently testifies to the bias in state
machinery against the victims.
In any case the state has thus been directly causing the rise in caste atrocities and is also guilty of
dereliction of responsibility in curbing them.
1. Positive Discrimination
The most celebrated policy of positive discrimination in favour of the SCs and STs has also been
lackadaisically operated. Even after six decades the reservations in public sector jobs haven’t
reached the prescribed percentage in the Class A and B, where only it gains some meaning. The
Class C and D being largely low paying working class jobs, dalits will be naturally found in them
in significant proportion. It is interesting to note that having agreed to grant reservations equal to
the ratio of SC/ST population to total population, the government still goes by the old 15 and 7.5
percent as against the current ratios of 16.23 and 8.2 percent respectively. The reservations in
jobs have been rendered meaningless since last two decades. Because of the onslaught of
globalization there has been negative growth in the public sector jobs. The statistics reveals that
the total number of public sector jobs had reached the peak in 1997 with the euphoria of reforms
but have been on consistent decline since then. If there is no net job creation in the public sector,
there is no reservation!

With regard to reservation in education, it particularly applied to elite/professional institutions
where because of the acute competition Dalit students ordinarily would not have found a place.
Moreover, unlike in jobs, the percentage fulfillment of vacancies in educational institutions has
been better. These reservations indeed have catalyzed spread of education among Dalits But with
increasing privatization and commercialization of professional education, even this reservation is
losing its meaning. The ethos of globalization has raised the cost of education so high even in
public institutions that it is ordinarily not possible for an average SC/ST student to dream of
educating in these institutions. Generally, it became the domain reserved for the well to do
SC/ST persons, which is creating its own problematic for the community. Globalization has
created a multi-layered education supply according to socio-economic standing of people,
creating thus a neo-caste system in the sphere of education right from nursery to doctoral
degrees. The recent ploy to subvert the Constitutional mandate to provide free compulsory
education to all children up to the age of 14, in the form of Right to Education Act has
formalized the neoliberal development in education. While the best quality education became
available in the country for handful elite, the masses are left with useless education to swell the
statistics. The entire rural area, with nearly 70 percent of population and with preponderance of
Dalits is virtually cut off from education of any consequence. The jobless growth and
informalization of jobs has drained off motivation in Dalits for education.
Generally the reservation policy, the way it is formulated, leads to create an increasingly smaller
class of beneficiary at the cost of rest of the community. Since caste is the only basis for being
eligible for reservation, the people who have already benefitted from reservation stand better
chance in grabbing it. At the very theoretical level, it is directly opposite to the intended outcome
of the policy. It has already created a rift among the Dalits which is threatening to demolish
whatever little they accomplished in forging their political identity. Since reservations are based
on sole criteria of caste, this anomaly is also noted in caste terms. The smaller sub-castes of
Dalits have accused a populous caste in the region of having grabbed their share of reservation
and demanded apportioning of them to various castes. This process has created war like situation
among the Dalit castes, as exemplified by Mala-Madiga conflict in Andhra Pradesh, effectively
absolving the state or Constitution of its misdoing. Notwithstanding that much of it has been
politically prompted to aggravate division among already fragmented Dalits, the fact remains
that ruling classes have forged reservations as weapon to divide Dalits asunder. In the context of
this problem, I had written by way of intervention proposing a simple solution22 to change the
basis of reservation from caste to a family unit over the dalit domain. It was repeated at few
times and earned praise from the intellectual circles but the Dalits for whom it was meant, just
ignored it.
Reservations originally meant to be an exceptional policy for the SC/STs as the ‘exceptional’
people has been forged into a weapon by the political class. As Macaulay conceived creation of asmall English educated section imbibing western culture and values for effective governance of
the native population in colonies, reservations worked the same way to create a small section of
Dalit elite which would uphold the state and the status quo. It will thus hold majority of Dalits at
bay, effectively blocking their radical demands. Indeed, reservations, meant for a minority of
Dalits, who have come up to certain level so as to compete, have completely hijacked the entire
agenda of Dalit masses that may be seen comprising basic issues such as land, health, quality
education, and secure employment. At the level of Constitution itself reservations having been
deliberately taken as a remedy for backwardness, the ruling classes could easily and skillfully
proliferate their misuse. Firstly, they extended the same to the so called backward castes, when
as a broad caste group they had already become economically and politically strong. Now, they
are fooling people by promising them to every conceivable community in the country. In a
country with pervasive backwardness, to identify caste as the marker itself is grossly
mischievous. The interesting part of this development is that when practically reservations have
come to an end, the reservation discourse is reaching its crescendo.
The only reservations that have worked well as far as implementation is concerned are the
reservations in political representations only because they were primarily meant for the ruling
classes. Contrary to ignorant notion of most people, these reservations (and not others) were
meant only for 10 years, which means they should have ended by 1960. But before they come to
an end, they get extended by another term of 10 years, by the political class with exceptional
unanimity, without any demand from any corner ever being there. These reservations, which
have their roots in the infamous Poona Pact between Gandhi and Ambedkar, have only produced
stooges (in Kashiram’s language23) and have rather taken away winds from dalit politics.
Babasaheb Ambedkar himself was seriously skeptical about it after seeing its aftermath during
his own life time.
2. Developmental measures
In terms of development, there are a plethora of schemes that the government operates in order to
bridge the gap between the SC/ST and the non-SC/ST population. Looking at the results over the
last six decades, one can only lament at these efforts as misplaced. While the statistics might
show positive trend in development indices of the SC/STs, the gap between them and the others
does not show the same. Most of these schemes have their genesis in wooing dalit voters in
elections. In the context of the fact that 78 percent people live off Rs 20 per day such effort any
way lose its meaning.
The most celebrated programme of the government in this regard has been the special component
plans. The strategy of Scheduled Castes Sub-Plan (SCSP) which was evolved in 1979 is one of
the most propagandized intervention through the planning process for social, economic andeducational development of scheduled castes and for improvement in their working and living
conditions. It is an umbrella strategy to ensure flow of targeted financial and physical benefits
from all the general sectors of development for the benefit of SCs. Under this strategy, it entails
targeted flow of funds and associated benefits from the annual plan of States / Union Territories
(UTs) at least in proportion to the SC population. Presently, 27 States / UTs having sizeable SC
populations are implementing Scheduled Castes Sub-Plan. Although the SC population,
according to 2001 Census, was 16.66 crores constituting 16.23% of the total population of India,
the allocations made through SCSP in recent years have been much lower than the population
proportion. The data on total State Plan Outlay flow to SCSP as reported by the State / UT
Governments for the last few years, especially since the present UPA government is in power,
indicates rising allocations, which however still fall short of the prescribed level. It went up from
11.06 percent in 2004-05 to 14.80 percent in 2007-08.24 These bland percentages do not reveal
the true story. Firstly, the allocations in government parlance do not mean actual expenditure and
secondly, as the experience with Common Wealth Games and many other projects shows, there
has been persistent mischief in booking general expenditure under these heads.
Recently, the government has launched a new developmental measure in terms of reserving 4
percent value of all government contracts for Dalit entrepreneurs. The government which has
been utterly insensitive to the needs of common masses has rushed with exemplary enthusiasm to
support what is being clamored by a handful of Dalits as ‘Dalit Capitalism’. Dalits trying out
entrepreneurship is not a new development. The very making of the Dalit movement itself could
be traced to this phenomenon among the migrant dalits to urban centers. As regards prevalence
of rich individuals among Dalits also is not a new phenomenon. For varied reasons certain
exceptional individuals in every reason had amassed wealth and were extraordinarily rich. This
may have naturally increased with spread of education and information among dalits in modern
times. But to attribute it to globalization or to colour it new way of dalit emancipation surely
smacks of serving the intrigues of global capital. Be it as it may, the state attitude certainly
reveals its intention to promote elements that would take pride in its anti-people policies and
isolate the masses.
The above discussion may fall under the category of ‘omissions’ by the state. There are the
things that the state does in commission mode too. The state has actively helped the
ruling classes in maintaining Dalits in dependent mode, confining them to constitutional
frame. Whenever Dalits tried to articulate their independent struggle and tended to drift
away from the constitutional frame, it showed its hypersensitivity in dealing with them.
The age old strategies of cooptation or repression were deployed every time it happened.
The disillusion with the government and the parliamentary politics of the Republican
Party had set in among Dalits way back in 1970s which manifested into a rebellious
phenomenon of Dalit literature and their political movements like Dalit panthers andDalit Sangharsh Samiti (DSS) in this state. These movements partly due to their own
weaknesses but to a large extent to the intrigues of the ruling classes splintered into
degenerate and opportunistic outfits. This sad aftermath pushed the sincere elements of
dalit youth towards the radical left politics in certain states since 1980s. Since this politics
defy constitutional boundaries and hence does not make itself available for cooptation,
the state of late has taken an unconstitutional offensive to crush it. This has been the
strategy to terrorize dalit youth so as to push them back into the morass of constitutional
politics. Any Dalit, speaking a radical language is targeted and harassed. The
spontaneous initiative of Dalit youth in the wake of Khairlanji was similarly crushed by
the state.25 In recent times, scores of Dalit youth known to be active in literary, cultural
and social movements have been arrested in Maharashtra labeling them as Maoists.26
They are incarcerated in jails for years fighting dozens of false cases, destroying their
families and their own careers. The label works well with the mainstream dalits in
conveniently ignoring them. It is not the question of Maoists being right or wrong; the
business of passing such value judgements really belongs to history. But what is
important is to condemn the state which comes down heavily on the movements of
‘precariats’27 at the behest of the ruling classes and problematize the constitution that
permits it.
This brings me to the end of my speech. Much of what I said here may have disturbed the
sensibilities of many people basically because it was unfamiliar. I have faulted not only the state
but the formation of the SC/ST itself as well as the Constitution. As promised, I tried to do my
job in truly iconoclastic spirit, sparing no holy cows. Indeed, I believe the time has come to do
ruthless introspection and plain speaking. This brief analysis may indicate that there is no
solution within the system for the scores of Dalits, Adivasis, and other such poor people. It is not
only in India but in the entire world; the plight of the poor is more or less the same. They are
slowly realizing that the trap of liberal democracy has been the basic culprit. It creates illusion of
high sounding values but in reality preserves the status quo in favour of the ruling classes. The
challenge therefore is to smash this trap as only then the real emancipation of people, including
SC/STs may be possible.
                                                                
                                                      Notes and references


1
 This was the official term used for the lower strata of Indian society from mid-19th century.
2
 See, Lelah Dushkin, Scheduled Caste Policy in India: History, Problems, Prospects, Asian Survey, Vol. 7,
No. 9 (Sep., 1967), pp. 626-636.
3
 See the discussions of the problem of defining and listing the Scheduled Castes in Census of India, 1931.
Vol. I, India, Part I, Report, Appendix I, p. 472. This appendix, slightly abridged, appears in Appendix A of J.
H. Hutton, Caste in India, 4th Edition (Bombay: Oxford University Press, 1963), pp. 192-222.
4 Mohinder Singh, The Depressed Classes (Bombay: Hind Kitabs Ltd., 1947), p. 2; Government of India
Ministry of Home Affairs, Annual Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes for
the Year 1951, p. 10.
5 R.Vaidyanathan, Caste as Social Capital, http://www.dnaindia.com/opinion/column_caste-as-socialcapital_1387350. Last accessed: 23 january 2012.
6
 L.P. Vidyarthi and Binay Kumar Rai, The Tribal Culture of India, Concept Publishing, New Delhi, 1985, p.
415.
7
 G S Ghurye, 1963, The Scheduled Tribes, Popular Prakashan, Bombay
8
 Kodanda Rao, Critique of the Indian Constitution,
http://www.yabaluri.org/TRIVENI/CDWEB/critiqueoftheindianConstitutionjul60.htm.
9
 L G Hovanur (Chairman), Report of the Karnataka Backward Classes Commission (Hovanur Report), Ch
XVIII: Communal origin and communal composition of the constituent assembly,
http://lghavanur.org/chapter18.html. Last accessed: 23 January 2012.
10 Singhvi, Abhishek “India's Constitution and Individual Rights: Diverse Perspectives”. George Washington
International Law Review, The. FindArticles.com. 07 Oct, 2011.
11 See Constitutional Proposals of the Sapru Committee, 256-57 (Tej Bahadur Sapru et al. eds., 1946.
12 W.H. Morris-Jones, The Government and Politics of India 83-84 (2d ed. 1967); Ray, supra note 15, at 100-01.
13 Vasant Moon (Comp), Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, Education department, Maharsahtra
Government, Mumbai, (From Dr. Ambedkar's entry into the Constituent Assembly to the presentation of the
Draft of the Indian Constitution to the Constituent Assembly Vol. 13, p. 9.
14 Government of India, Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms, Office Memorandum No.
9/2/73-Estt. (S.C.T.), 23 June, 1975.
15 To the question that he was a maker of the constitution, Dr Ambedkar himself had replied saying: “Now, Sir,
we have inherited a tradition. People always keep on saying to me: “Oh, you are the maker of the
Constitution.” My answer is I was a hack. What I was asked to do, I did much against my will.” See Vasant
Moon (Comp), Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, Education department, Maharashtra
Government, Mumbai, Vol. 15, p. 860.
16 Cited by V. Lenin, The State and Revolution,
http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/ch01.htm. last accessed: 23 January 2012
17 The salient findings of the survey were: In 73% of the villages, dalits cannot enter non-dalit homes; in 70% of
the villages, dalits cannot eat with non-dalits; in 64% of the villages, dalits cannot enter common temples; in
53% of the villages, dalit women suffer ill-treatment at the hands of non-dalit women. See Sukhadeo Thorat,
Untouchability in Rural India (Sage Publications, New Delhi, 2006.
18 Understanding Untouchability: A comprehensive Study of Practices and Conditions in 1589 Villages,
http://www.indianet.nl/pdf/UnderstandingUntouchability.pdf. Last accessed: 23 January 2012.
19 Anand Teltumbde, Khairlanji: A Strange and Bitter Crop, Navayana, New Delhi, 2008. Also, Anand
Teltumbde, The Persistence of Caste, Zed books, London, 2010]
20 On 20 July 2010, some manual scavengers of Savanur, a small town in Haveri district of north Karnataka
performed a novel act in protest against their helplessness. They smeared themselves with human excreta in
public before the municipal council office.
21 On October 15, 2010, one Dharam Kumar, a Dalit manual scavenger from Gulbarga district in northern
Karnataka, poured and smeared human excreta over his head and body in front of the office of the Gulbarga
City Corporation to draw attention of the city corporation officials to the issue of contracts for the maintenance
of a pay-and-use toilet in Gulbarga City. The Hindu, Bangalore Edition, October 16, 2010, p.1.
22 For example, See Anand Teltumbde, Reservation within Reservation: A Solution, Economic & Political
Weekly, vol xliv no 41, october 10, 2009.

23 See Kanshiram, The Chamcha Age (An Era of the Stooges), Available:
http://ambedkar.org/research/The_Chamcha_Age.htm. Last Accessed: 23 January 2012
24 Information in respect of 14 States/UTs only and as on 31-12- 2007. Source: Network for Social
Accountability (NSA) http://nsa.org.in. Last Accessed: 23 January 2012.
25 See for details Anand Teltumbde, Khairlanji, Op. Cit.
26 Anand Teltumbde, Yet Another Binayak Sen, Economic & Political Weekly, february 5, 2011 vol xlvi no 6 
27 Anand Teltumbde, The ‘Precariat’ Strikes, Economic and political weekly, Vol XLVII No.1 January 07, 2012.