Thursday, December 30, 2010

Growing Intolerance to Freedom of Expression and civil liberties


Need judicial reforms and a debate on the issues of sedition and governance


By Vidya Bhushan Rawat


As year 2010 is approaching to an end, the outrageous verdict pronounced by a Raipur court to Dr Binayak Sen is a reminder of how judicial system is working in India particularly the lower judiciary. It has not only shocked the nation but also proved that in this country any talk of senses would be dealt by the government and its authorities in the similar way. It is more shameful when we find the same charges being leveled against Arundhati Roy for alleged ‘anti-national’ remarks on Kashmir. It is sadly a poor reflection on how things are manipulated in India by authorities.. Definitely, it shocked the middle class upper caste Hindus also who think how such charge can be leveled against him. So far treason and sedition charges are always domain of the ‘Muslims’ but now we are turning more ‘secular’ for the same.

But my issue is not with what Binayak Sen and Arundhati Roy write or who they meet which actually is part of the life of all of us who claim to work for people. As human rights activist we are supposed to meet and visit people who feel they are threatened and wrongly abused by the state and its authorities. All this is part of democratic process as the aim is to bring people to negotiating table and force the state to be more responsible. State has all the power and that power need to be used with utmost care and more responsibility and accountability. State can not act in a streetfight acting on tit for tat slogan.

We all know that in the past 20 years, India has further degenerated in to the core values of state’s responsibility. The directive principles of our constitution guided us to make a responsible state towards the Dalits and Adivasis. As the assertion of Dalits and Adviasis grew, the state started abdicating its responsibility in a very shrewd way. The two important issues that are part and parcel of our struggle are Land Redistribution and participation in power structure through reservation in the government jobs. Since 1990s, they became target of the ruling elite. Hence on the one hand, the subsequent government in post 1990s opted for opening up of Indian market and thus killing our farmers on the one hand and allowing privatization of more and more companies thus reducing the job quota to a virtual nil in the government sector. This was the silent poison introduce by the government. The ruling elite were not satisfied with this only. The marginalization and isolation of Muslims was complete. Though this country has a history of communal disturbances yet Babari demolition shook the very basic foundation of our nationhood yet nothing happened to those who were behind the killings of people and incited hatred against the ‘second largest community’ in India Contrary to what we felt that these communalist forces would be thrashed and sent to jail, we saw Lal Krishna Advani became deputy prime minister of the country for his Ayodhya Kand. Narendra Modi became chief minister after massacring thousands of Muslims in Gujarat and Kalyan Singh who took oath to defend the Babari Mosque was sentenced to one day imprisonment for a clear act of sedition which actually created an unprecedented divide in the country. We did not a find single sentence for those who allegedly were responsible for massacring thousands of Sikhs in Delhi’s 1984 riots. After 1993 riots Bal Thackrey’s Shiv Sena came to power in Maharastra. Why not a fast track court for our politicians? Can there be any case against Lal Krishna Advani, Narendra Modi, Uma Bharati and Kalyan Singh under sedition. No, they have raised the consciousness of this country for Ram Mandir, the ‘most important’ issue the country, hence they got awarded with power in the country. Actually, questioning the mainstream politics has become very much like a blasphemy law in India and that could send you to jail. This has to be challenged at all level.

If these things were not enough to break the bone of the people of India, the power brokers forced the government to grab the fertile land of the country. Millions of hectares of land was handed over in a throw away prices to the industrialists who suck our blood from morning till evening. The authorities were hell bent to grab all these for the ‘development’ of our country. In each spheres of our life we find rampant corruption which is killing us. Our politicians, bureaucrats, journalists, along with corporate have looted our resources and displaced people from their own places without providing an alternatives. No debate is taking place in parliament on the issues of national concern. If one party opposes certain initiative, they are doing the same in their state. The Hindutva people knew it very well that a cocktail of ‘capital’ and ‘brahmanism’ is best suited to protect their interests in India and hence they have Brahmanised the Indian polity resulting almost no opposition for government policies on corporate. That is why any mention of ‘Hindu terrorist evoke such sharp reactions in Indian media. They do not have same when we refer to Islamic terrorists or Muslim terrorists. The media already become part of the power gangs and judiciary out of domain for the poor, there is no way out for the poorest of the poor. The issues of tribal are in direct conflict with the issue of development. It is not that they do not want it but then the question is whether any one of us ever thought what they want. The democratic deficit in tribal land turned their anger against the state. Hundreds of them have been arrested and put into the jails for no faults of them. Their voices rarely got representation in the mainstream for the sake of ‘community representation’. It is difficult to understand that even the political parties claiming to work for them rarely raised those issues in Parliament and state assemblies.

Land grabbing helped all those contractors come in close contacts of the power elite. Each event in this country has relation with land grabbing and corruption. It is therefore important why right from Common Wealth Games to building of dams, parks, hotels, resorts, SEZs, High ways are the out come of a big disease called brahmanical capitalism at the moment being developed under the supervision of power elites. There is no debate for it as most of them have their hand strained in the blood of the people. That the issue of corruption will never become an issue as it does not influence people who have grown up in worshipping our political class. The only thing is that it has decentralized. Earlier it has brahmanical hegemony but now slowly the Dalit-Bahujans are also having their take in it though their percentage seems to be very low. But at the end of the day, the impact of this is on the poorest of the poor whether it is taken by any one. You can only be good if you dance to the tone of corporate. Hence a Nitish Kumar will turn sour if he does not allot land to some Tatas or Ambanis on throw away prices like Naveen Patnayak.

When the voices of opposition are nowhere then who has to play the role of it. Hundreds of local struggles have emerged up against the state policies which are uprooting people from their land. Whether it is Chhattishgarh state which is currently being ruled by a non tribal and that is the biggest irony of the state,. Similarly, other states have been governed by those who did not remain behind to keep the Dalits and tribal out of their developmental plans. States such as Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Tamilnadu, Gujarat, Maharastra and Uttarakhand, have provided their fertile land and water resources are at the cost of their people to these greedy corporations, many of whom are being run by our ‘esteemed’ politicians, are facing the protest of the people who are resisting every bit of this illegal take over of their land cultivated and nurtured by their ancestors. For ‘national’ media these are ‘regional’ news but the unrest is high though not formidable as people have to look for their next day meal too. It is not my contention that people do not need development but as a human rights defender, I must add that if State has failed to improve the condition of the people then its sovereignty has no right to take the lives of the people. Where is the state when tribal are dying of hunger or their women are being raped by our police and forces? Will they not turn the people against its might? Why is Kashmir boiling? Why is the North East still unable to reconcile to us? It is not that they do not want to be with us but how have we treated them. Can a Kashmiri Muslim get a room on rent in our cities? What do the girls of the North East face truants in Delhi and other parts of the country? What are we as a state? A State of racist nature, which look down upon those who it feel different than us. Yes, as a nation we still worship the white skin and look down upon the black.

Therefore, it is logical for humanists, human rights activists, and social action groups to play the role of the opposition. The issues of Human Rights of the Dalits were taken to international agenda not by the political parties but by the Dalit rights activists who spoke there and presented despite the powerful opposition from the shameless government of India which denied existence of caste based prejudices in India citing the laws and acts in Indian constitution. It is important for the health of democracy that political parties raise the issues concerning the masses but over the last 20 years politics has just become the game of non political actors and that is a dangerous phenomenon. Political parties might have empowered some of them but it is the social movements which have changed the lives of the people. And since many of the writers, activists, struggles for people’s right over resources are challenging government’s action particularly on the issue of sovereignty they are easily targeted as ‘being anti national’ or supporting secessionists or in more popular discourse, supporting the Maoists. For a nation to survive as a healthy democracy, it is important that we have an open debate on issues concerning our people. A debate on Kashmir can not be judged on Barkha Dutt’s upper caste show on NDTV. It needs to be organized in Kashmir and let those champions of Hindutva be there and speak among the masses. The issue of Advasis, need to be discussed with their people and not with one or two members showcased in the TV studios of Delhi to justify that ‘we have space for ‘their’ voices. Let the journalist report going to nook and corners of the country and not become part and parcel of our ‘intelligence’ network. The greatest danger to our democracy is the growing disappearance of demarcation line between a reporter and an intelligence person, between a PR person and an editor. They all have merged together so much that it is important to know who is the person and what is he writing.

The self styled mainstream media has rarely spoken for people who are rotting in our jails. They speak for Dr Binayak Sen as they feel he was one among them. It is a class-caste consciousness which has shocked them that if such a thing could happen to him, it might happen to them. But the fact is media has completely lost interest in people’s issues. Binayak Sen is not important. Important is the issue of charges against him and the way police framed him. Important is to question our sedition laws and the issue of my right to criticize the state. He was critical of Salawa Judum which the state felt was providing justice to the tribal who were not Naxalites. Even the Supreme Court had held that state can not give private citizens right to kill each other and Salwa Judum was that. Hence, questioning state polices today is being considered as challenge to our sovereignty. Therefore, I am also happy that this verdict will expose the Indian judicial system, its courts, its trial methods and how they function. It is indeed a case for judicial reforms in India.

Therefore, it is not necessary for me to dwell on the argument of Dr Binayak Sen or Arundhati Roy which may suffer from flaws and we all have those flaws as we become too sensitive to the issues close to our heart and that is what true about those who fight for people’s right. We may differ on our perceptions but as writers, authors, human rights activists always believe in their perceptions and beliefs and that makes them different than others. We are not political leaders who speak for the ‘people’. We speak our voices and our feeling. As a human rights defender, I write many things which many may not like, of course, many others like them too yet, it is important that this freedom remain unchallenged. For, because of such people, the forces of state and its sponsored campaigns and laws are challenged.

Is not it a hypocrisy that when a Chinese dissenter got Nobel Peace Prize earlier this year, Indian government send its representative to attend the ceremony despite China’s effort to dissuade India from doing so. It was a great gesture in support of a human rights defender for democracy in that country who has been allegedly framed for treason in that country. Its shameful that Binayak Sen’s case is becoming a very similar one where the state is hell bent to prove that he worked against the state.. Binayak Sen might not have done so many things but in their dirty tricks the government officials will only make him bigger and larger than life. The world will only cry foul on conviction of the local court which looks like a kangaroo trial. For long there have been demands for a National judicial Commission and implementation of quota for SC-ST-OBCs, in the judiciary so that the judges themselves understand their issues with utmost care before passing a judgment. The courts have actually become biggest obstacles in progressive laws. Most of the judges have biases against Dalit-Adivasis and their issues related to them. The issue of quota is being made redundant through judicial interventions. Similarly, land reforms failed in India as in most of the cases the high and mighty went to court against land ceiling laws. The brahmanical minds created various side ways to destroy all the reforms and acts.

Binayak Sen has a formidable background as a doctor as well as a civil rights activist and hence his case became internationalized otherwise ordinary mortals like us would never ever think of civil libertarians and news papers supporting this freedom. Hence, we must support his release and ask for a thorough scrutiny of the conditions in Indian jails and reform in the judiciary. Binayak Sen is definitely bound to get justice but in the din of hello being created around, we must not forget thousands of innocents being put in the jail for being Jehadis, Naxalites and what not. Any one raise the issue for his right is charged with challenging the state and this mindset has to be challenged. It is time to start a complete debate on these issues which have emerged out of Binayak Sen’s conviction.

Monday, December 27, 2010

Understanding the importance of Mahad movement

Relevance of Mahad’s historical struggle

Manusmriti need to be burnt not in its physicality alone but also from our hearts and minds

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat


Two sisters from scavenging community were burnt to death by an upper caste mob in Moradabad district of Uttar-Pradesh for an alleged murder committed by their brother who is still at large. The family requested the police to protect them yet nothing happened. Contrary to what the girl’s distraught mother is saying, the Uttar-Pradesh police already suggested that the girls committed suicide because of the regular humiliation by their neighbors regarding their brothers.

Uttar-Pradesh, people say, is the laboratory of the Dalit-Bahujan politics. Unfortunately, Brahmanism still remains as powerful in the state as ever though its functionality and strategies have changed drastically. The Dalit- Bahujan concept has taken a beating here and to the best now the new agendas of different caste identities have emerged in the state. Tragically, this assertion movement has some where drifted from what Baba Saheb Ambedkar charted for all the oppressed of the country, a new vision under Buddha’s liberating path. Uttar-Pradesh has seen empowered Dalit Bahujan politics but unlike Maharastra the efforts for a counter culture here have not worked well. In the absence of a counter culture, the Dalit Bahujan leaderships of different communities are targeting each other and in the end reinforcing brahmanical beliefs of supremacy and purity. As long as caste remains, Brahmanism will work to the benefits of the powerful and maintain hegemonies of a few.

It is therefore necessary to revisit the historic path of Baba Saheb Ambedkar in Mahad where he fought the rights of the people denied human dignity and access the natural resources. Water is a natural resource and none has right to control it and Ambedkar’s fight for water right for the Dalits is an example of how people’s movement can bring social change as he was not just breaking the brahmanical hegemony over water but also pointing that without equality of women and their effective participation no movement would succeed. He, along with thousands of his followers, predominantly women, burnt Manusmriti, the law book of the Hindus. It was not just symbolic but a strong rejection of racist Hindu social order which denied human being equality, liberty and fraternity. It was just not a political issue as he made an important statement in burning Manusmriti, which means that the rejection of old order based on racial prejudices of cultural supremacy must essentially be part of any movement meant for social justice. Hence, December 25th must be celebrated as a human rights day of the oppressed all over the world. We can not leave this symbolic day to the pages of history only but take it further to demolish Machiavellian politics of highest kind where people are marginalized through divine sanctions and subjugated further in the name of Gods and the books supposedly written by them. No book was bigger than human liberty and freedom and therefore they need to be questioned and formulated according to modern concept of rights for all.

For every student of social sciences and human rights in India must read and understand this historical event of December 25th, 1927, as this will give them ideas to learn and understand what Ambedkar stood for and what he revolted. That was the time, when Baba Saheb challenged the religious superiority of Manu Smriti and termed it a law book of injustice and burnt it with his supporters, it was a big event for millions of people were fooled to believe in a book which can not be changed yet which was responsible for their miseries and sorrows. A person like Ambedkar would not believe in tokenism as he countered each of these laws with his thought provoking critical analysis, yet it was important for him to do something symbolic which sends a positive message among the community.

This is Ambedkar’s century and his forthright views are now a challenge for all hegemonies. Today, the movement for social justice can not imagine anything leaving Ambedkar from the centrality of it. Yet, very unfortunately, many new things are coming up projecting Ambedkar as a person from a particular community, who married to a non Dalit woman and most shockingly, they alleged, he embrace Buddhism under pressure of Hindus. This is the outcome of the growing caste identities being used for individual leaders and their fancies to achieve ‘political power’. There is nothing wrong in attaining political power but how will it sustain without a common cause and common rejection of the Varnashram dharma. How can we challenge Brahmanism without a counter-culture, which is more humane, progressive and ideologically stronger and better than an order based on prejudices and stereotypes? As Dalit Bahujan movement further split into the caste and sub-castes identities hitting at each other, the power of Ambedkar’s cultural vision become more than relevant for all of us. Ambedkar as a challenger of hegemony, a free thinker and an iconoclast would answer to all the irrelevant manipulations of his formulations and ideological constructs being constructed by these prophets of religions who find it unacceptable as why he embraced Buddhism. Problem with these thinking is that all of them denigrate Ambedkar’s great moral courage and hence it is essential to understand Ambedkar in true spirit of his philosophy of life and mission.

Yes, those who feel Ambedkar embraced Buddhism out of fear and pressure from Sangh Parivar do not really appreciate his commitment and strength. A man who could walk out of an audience with Pope John Paul just because the latter could not respond to his questions properly must have been having the courage of conviction. One must understand that Baba Saheb Ambedkar clearly mentioned that Hindu Fundamentalists are the biggest threat and Hindu Rashtra would be a colossal tragedy for India. He talked against political Islam and its threat. It would be very difficult to find a man of Ambedkar’s vision and courage who single handedly brought change in the lives of millions of people in India.

Ambedkar is the name of Freedom, liberty and enlightened individual. And he is aspiration and hope of millions of people denied rights and yet by dint of their hard work, they have challenge the brahmanical superstructure. He was a man of great pragmatism yet never ever compromised on his principles. His pragmatism never ever reflected in politics of opportunism which is very much part of today’s politics and politicians. His thrust on individual is a landmark from any standard as even European society and Americans had not discovered that individualism that Ambedkar aspired for. For him individual was supreme and those who denigrate individual can not really build a healthy society? Our societies deny individual the basic liberty and that is why it can not be called a society.

Today, on December 25th, we must have the courage to be as courageous as Baba Saheb Ambedkar was to his thoughts and action, his creations, his thoughts, of his convictions and commitments. His fight for the fundamental right of access to natural resources, added by rejection of the racist brahmanical order should be part of our college curriculum. Those who believe in egalitarian society must understand the meaning of Ambedkar and his fight for social justice. Today, in the world where our governments and societies are hurting the individual liberty the most, when our political parties are compromising with religious fundamentalists, when our Khap panchayats are deciding what we should do and what should we think, Ambedkar’s ideas remains a beacon of hope. Ambedkar is the hope for all the oppressed. The women in India need to understand that Dr Ambedkar’s struggle for them was supreme. This day when we celebrate the Christmas as big day, it is a big day for millions of people all over the world for their dignity and human right. His ideas need to globalised and propagated internationally so that more and more people understand the enormity of his struggle and modernity of his ideas which changed our world. Let president Obama read Dr Ambedkar and his writings and he will understand the cruelty of Indian village system as well as how a giant like Ambedkar could bring hopes in the lives of million without using any violent methods but simply advocating through a counter culture to oppression and subjugation. The politics of identity is great but as Ambedkar himself said about his own ‘ I was born as Hindu which was not in my hand but I will not die as a Hindu’. It clearly indicates that he was out to create new identity and harp on it. The sacrifice of Baba Saheb Ambedkar was for all of us to live in an enlightened society. We can not have our vision by reasserting our identities created under the brahmanical construct. A new dawn need to be created which means a cultural change is prerequisite for making final assault on Brahmanism and Ambedkar has shown us the path. It is time we chose that identity charted by him and get out of this big brahmanical game of hurting each other. We all may have minor contradiction but we need to understand the bigger contradiction of our life is with the order created by Manu. Baba Saheb chose to hit at that bigger contradiction in Mahad and it is time we need to follow that again and again. We may burn Manu Smriti in public but let us throw it away in the rubbish bin of history and pledge to work for a humanist society as envisaged by Baba Saheb Ambedkar. When we shed our internal prejudices then the mother of the scavenging community girls who were brutally burnt Moradabad would not feel isolated with in the Dalit Bahujan politics and we will not raise an issue when there is a good political crop to harvest. That time every individual is important for us as Baba Saheb time and again maintained. It is tragic that like the Hindus we also prejudge things and confine ourselves in the realm of identity politics. Baba Saheb’s message was meant for all of us and we must come in solidarity of all who need us. It is here that Balmikis of Moradabad need our support. Even if, as some people assume that the brothers of these girls who were burnt, were criminals, that does not mean that the girls and their family should have paid the price for the crime they never committed. Blaming people on their birth identity and on the crime of some one else is brahanical and need to be challenged at all level including our personal and ideological discourse. The biggest defeat of Manu Smriti would be the social-cultural unity of victims of that order created by it, but in the absence of a concrete programme of action and because of conspicuous silence on matter such as these killings create further rifts in the people and make them fall in the hands of those who are actually the biggest offenders of our dignity and human rights. Unity will never happen with big jargons and rhetoric but is only possible with expression of solidarity and participating and being part of every struggle for human dignity and human rights. And message from Mahad is that intellectuals who write must ensure at least some time of their life to be participants of a social movement and struggle for change. How did Baba Saheb Ambedkar found time to write so many things and yet be part of all the major struggles. His writings and work had the conviction strongly inbuilt that unless we become part of social movements for change and unless we shed these brahmanical prejudices and values in our personality, we will always be carrying Manu in our heart and mind. Ambedkar did not have the patience to hear Pope that it will take so many centuries for elimination of caste system and walked out of him. Ambedkar has done his work, it is time for us to pledge that we will not sit ideally unless this notorious system is demolished and the best way to do so would be by taking further his path and creating an enlightened and equitable society, if not among all, at least among our own selves.

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Mahad's historical struggle and its importance today

Relevance of Mahad’s historical struggle

Manusmriti need to be burnt not in its physicality alone but also from our hearts and minds

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat


Two sisters from scavenging community were burnt to death by an upper caste mob in Moradabad district of Uttar-Pradesh for an alleged murder committed by their brother who is still at large. The family requested the police to protect them yet nothing happened. Contrary to what the girl’s distraught mother is saying, the Uttar-Pradesh police already suggested that the girls committed suicide because of the regular humiliation by their neighbors regarding their brothers.

Uttar-Pradesh, people say, is the laboratory of the Dalit-Bahujan politics. Unfortunately, Brahmanism still remains as powerful in the state as ever though its functionality and strategies have changed drastically. The Dalit- Bahujan concept has taken a beating here and to the best now the new agendas of different caste identities have emerged in the state. Tragically, this assertion movement has some where drifted from what Baba Saheb Ambedkar charted for all the oppressed of the country, a new vision under Buddha’s liberating path. Uttar-Pradesh has seen empowered Dalit Bahujan politics but unlike Maharastra the efforts for a counter culture here have not worked well. In the absence of a counter culture, the Dalit Bahujan leaderships of different communities are targeting each other and in the end reinforcing brahmanical beliefs of supremacy and purity. As long as caste remains, Brahmanism will work to the benefits of the powerful and maintain hegemonies of a few.

It is therefore necessary to revisit the historic path of Baba Saheb Ambedkar in Mahad where he fought the rights of the people denied human dignity and access the natural resources. Water is a natural resource and none has right to control it and Ambedkar’s fight for water right for the Dalits is an example of how people’s movement can bring social change as he was not just breaking the brahmanical hegemony over water but also pointing that without equality of women and their effective participation no movement would succeed. He, along with thousands of his followers, predominantly women, burnt Manusmriti, the law book of the Hindus. It was not just symbolic but a strong rejection of racist Hindu social order which denied human being equality, liberty and fraternity. It was just not a political issue as he made an important statement in burning Manusmriti, which means that the rejection of old order based on racial prejudices of cultural supremacy must essentially be part of any movement meant for social justice. Hence, December 25th must be celebrated as a human rights day of the oppressed all over the world. We can not leave this symbolic day to the pages of history only but take it further to demolish Machiavellian politics of highest kind where people are marginalized through divine sanctions and subjugated further in the name of Gods and the books supposedly written by them. No book was bigger than human liberty and freedom and therefore they need to be questioned and formulated according to modern concept of rights for all.

For every student of social sciences and human rights in India must read and understand this historical event of December 25th, 1927, as this will give them ideas to learn and understand what Ambedkar stood for and what he revolted. That was the time, when Baba Saheb challenged the religious superiority of Manu Smriti and termed it a law book of injustice and burnt it with his supporters, it was a big event for millions of people were fooled to believe in a book which can not be changed yet which was responsible for their miseries and sorrows. A person like Ambedkar would not believe in tokenism as he countered each of these laws with his thought provoking critical analysis, yet it was important for him to do something symbolic which sends a positive message among the community.

This is Ambedkar’s century and his forthright views are now a challenge for all hegemonies. Today, the movement for social justice can not imagine anything leaving Ambedkar from the centrality of it. Yet, very unfortunately, many new things are coming up projecting Ambedkar as a person from a particular community, who married to a non Dalit woman and most shockingly, they alleged, he embrace Buddhism under pressure of Hindus. This is the outcome of the growing caste identities being used for individual leaders and their fancies to achieve ‘political power’. There is nothing wrong in attaining political power but how will it sustain without a common cause and common rejection of the Varnashram dharma. How can we challenge Brahmanism without a counter-culture, which is more humane, progressive and ideologically stronger and better than an order based on prejudices and stereotypes? As Dalit Bahujan movement further split into the caste and sub-castes identities hitting at each other, the power of Ambedkar’s cultural vision become more than relevant for all of us. Ambedkar as a challenger of hegemony, a free thinker and an iconoclast would answer to all the irrelevant manipulations of his formulations and ideological constructs being constructed by these prophets of religions who find it unacceptable as why he embraced Buddhism. Problem with these thinking is that all of them denigrate Ambedkar’s great moral courage and hence it is essential to understand Ambedkar in true spirit of his philosophy of life and mission.

Yes, those who feel Ambedkar embraced Buddhism out of fear and pressure from Sangh Parivar do not really appreciate his commitment and strength. A man who could walk out of an audience with Pope John Paul just because the latter could not respond to his questions properly must have been having the courage of conviction. One must understand that Baba Saheb Ambedkar clearly mentioned that Hindu Fundamentalists are the biggest threat and Hindu Rashtra would be a colossal tragedy for India. He talked against political Islam and its threat. It would be very difficult to find a man of Ambedkar’s vision and courage who single handedly brought change in the lives of millions of people in India.

Ambedkar is the name of Freedom, liberty and enlightened individual. And he is aspiration and hope of millions of people denied rights and yet by dint of their hard work, they have challenge the brahmanical superstructure. He was a man of great pragmatism yet never ever compromised on his principles. His pragmatism never ever reflected in politics of opportunism which is very much part of today’s politics and politicians. His thrust on individual is a landmark from any standard as even European society and Americans had not discovered that individualism that Ambedkar aspired for. For him individual was supreme and those who denigrate individual can not really build a healthy society? Our societies deny individual the basic liberty and that is why it can not be called a society.

Today, on December 25th, we must have the courage to be as courageous as Baba Saheb Ambedkar was to his thoughts and action, his creations, his thoughts, of his convictions and commitments. His fight for the fundamental right of access to natural resources, added by rejection of the racist brahmanical order should be part of our college curriculum. Those who believe in egalitarian society must understand the meaning of Ambedkar and his fight for social justice. Today, in the world where our governments and societies are hurting the individual liberty the most, when our political parties are compromising with religious fundamentalists, when our Khap panchayats are deciding what we should do and what should we think, Ambedkar’s ideas remains a beacon of hope. Ambedkar is the hope for all the oppressed. The women in India need to understand that Dr Ambedkar’s struggle for them was supreme. This day when we celebrate the Christmas as big day, it is a big day for millions of people all over the world for their dignity and human right. His ideas need to globalised and propagated internationally so that more and more people understand the enormity of his struggle and modernity of his ideas which changed our world. Let president Obama read Dr Ambedkar and his writings and he will understand the cruelty of Indian village system as well as how a giant like Ambedkar could bring hopes in the lives of million without using any violent methods but simply advocating through a counter culture to oppression and subjugation. The politics of identity is great but as Ambedkar himself said about his own ‘ I was born as Hindu which was not in my hand but I will not die as a Hindu’. It clearly indicates that he was out to create new identity and harp on it. The sacrifice of Baba Saheb Ambedkar was for all of us to live in an enlightened society. We can not have our vision by reasserting our identities created under the brahmanical construct. A new dawn need to be created which means a cultural change is prerequisite for making final assault on Brahmanism and Ambedkar has shown us the path. It is time we chose that identity charted by him and get out of this big brahmanical game of hurting each other. We all may have minor contradiction but we need to understand the bigger contradiction of our life is with the order created by Manu. Baba Saheb chose to hit at that bigger contradiction in Mahad and it is time we need to follow that again and again. We may burn Manu Smriti in public but let us throw it away in the rubbish bin of history and pledge to work for a humanist society as envisaged by Baba Saheb Ambedkar. When we shed our internal prejudices then the mother of the scavenging community girls who were brutally burnt Moradabad would not feel isolated with in the Dalit Bahujan politics and we will not raise an issue when there is a good political crop to harvest. That time every individual is important for us as Baba Saheb time and again maintained. It is tragic that like the Hindus we also prejudge things and confine ourselves in the realm of identity politics. Baba Saheb’s message was meant for all of us and we must come in solidarity of all who need us. It is here that Balmikis of Moradabad need our support. Even if, as some people assume that the brothers of these girls who were burnt, were criminals, that does not mean that the girls and their family should have paid the price for the crime they never committed. Blaming people on their birth identity and on the crime of some one else is brahanical and need to be challenged at all level including our personal and ideological discourse. The biggest defeat of Manu Smriti would be the social-cultural unity of victims of that order created by it, but in the absence of a concrete programme of action and because of conspicuous silence on matter such as these killings create further rifts in the people and make them fall in the hands of those who are actually the biggest offenders of our dignity and human rights. Unity will never happen with big jargons and rhetoric but is only possible with expression of solidarity and participating and being part of every struggle for human dignity and human rights. And message from Mahad is that intellectuals who write must ensure at least some time of their life to be participants of a social movement and struggle for change. How did Baba Saheb Ambedkar found time to write so many things and yet be part of all the major struggles. His writings and work had the conviction strongly inbuilt that unless we become part of social movements for change and unless we shed these brahmanical prejudices and values in our personality, we will always be carrying Manu in our heart and mind. Ambedkar did not have the patience to hear Pope that it will take so many centuries for elimination of caste system and walked out of him. Ambedkar has done his work, it is time for us to pledge that we will not sit ideally unless this notorious system is demolished and the best way to do so would be by taking further his path and creating an enlightened and equitable society, if not among all, at least among our own selves.