Gandhi - Ambedkar Correspondence

Discussion with B. R. Ambedkar September 22, 1932 AMBEDKAR: We must accept that in the country there are two groups belonging to two different ideologies and act accordingly, and I should get my compensation. I also want that a clear understanding should be arrived at which would recompense me in other respects also. The decision of the Government gives me seventy-one seats and I feel that is a just, reasonable and definite allocation. GANDHIJI: According to you. A. Over and above that I get the right to vote and contest elections in the general constituencies. I also have a franchise in the labourers constituencies. We do realize that you are of immense help to us. G. Not to you personally. A. But I have only one quarrel with you, that is, you work for the so-called national welfare and not for our interests alone. If you devoted yourself entirely to the welfare of the Depressed Classes, you would then become our hero. G. Very sweet of you to say so. A. I want political power for my community. That is indispensable for our survival. The basis of the agreement therefore should be: I should get what is due to me. I wish to tell the Hindus that I should be assured of my compensation. G. You have clarified your position very beautifully. However, I should like to ask you one question. You say that if there is any genuine party among the Depressed Classes it should be given sufficient scope to rise. Therefore their refusal to accept joint electorates without primary elections is quite reasonable. What I do not understand is why you have not said so far that there should be a separate election of this kind. I feel from whatever study I have made of the subject that if I accept the primary election, the letter of my vow is not violated. I therefore accept the Clause [of primary election] but I would most certainly have to scrutinize its wording. At the moment, I say only this, that the idea of separate primary

elections does not go against my vow. But I suspect something when you insist that the panel should consist only of three candidates. It does not give me sufficient place to turn in. Moreover, you consider panel system for some seats only, thereby satisfying both the parties [among Harijans]. There would be one election, i.e., of the primary nature by the Harijan voters only. The other would be by the joint electorate. I have to safeguard without any discrimination not the interest of one group alone but of the Depressed Class as a whole. I want to serve the untouchables. That is why I am not at all angry with you. When you use derogatory and angry words for me, I tell myself that I deserved that. I will not get angry even if you spit on my face. I say this with God as witness. I know that you have drunk deep of the poisoned cup. However, I make a claim, which will seem astounding to you. You are born an untouchable but I am an untouchable by adoption. And as a new convert I feel more for the welfare of the community than those who are already there . At the moment I have before my eyes the dumb untouchablesunapproachables and unseeablesof South India. I am scrutinizing the scheme to see how these people will be affected by it. You will of course say why I should worry about that. All of you will either accept Christianity or Islam. I say that you may do whatever you like after my body falls. What I say is that if the panel system is good for the Depressed Classes it should be good for the entire electorate. I do not like it from the beginning that the community should be divided into two groups. I will raze to the ground the fort of sanatanists with dynamite if all the untouchables are one and united. I want that the entire untouchable community should unitedly rebel against the sanatanists. You should not worry about the number as long as the appointing power is in your hands. I am a lifelong democrat. The whole world will agree that I was the foremost among the democrats after my ashes are scattered in the air or, if that does not happen, after they are immersed in the Ganga. I do not say this out of pride but tell the truth with humility. I learnt the lesson of democracy at the tender age of 12. I quarreled with my mother for treating the domestic sweeper as an untouchable. That day I saw God in the form of a Bhangi. You spoke the truth when you said that the welfare of untouchables is dearer to you than my own life. Now be honest and stick to it. You should not care for my life. But do not be false to Harijans. My work will not die with me. I have asked my son to convey my message to the Conference. In that, I have said that they should not be tempted to forsake the interests of the Harijans in order to save my life. I am sure that if I die my son will definitely follow me. Not only he but many others also will lay down their lives, for I do not have only one son, I have thousands. He would not be my worthy son if he did not lay down his life for the honour of Hinduism. Without eradicating untouchability root and branch the honour of Hinduism cannot be saved. That can only happen when untouchables are treated on par with caste Hindus in every respect. A person who is regarded as unseeable today should also have the opportunity to become the Viceroy of India. I had said, in the first political speech I

made on coming to India that I would like to make a Bhangi the President of the Congress. So I appeal to you not to haggle. Do not bring to me something, which is so bad that I would not even like the look of it. Bring to me some nice present, which would inspire life into a person who is willingly courting death. However you will do that only if you are convinced that my co-operation has some value.

(Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi-Vol. 57: 5 SEPTEMBER, 1932 - 15 NOVEMBER, 1932) [From Gujarati] Mahadevbhaini Diary, Vol. II, p. 69-72

Discussion with B. R. Ambedkar October 17, 1932 AMBEDKAR: I have not come to discuss untouchability but political matters. GANDHIJI: That is true. I cannot talk about it with you; even if you do I shall not be able to express an opinionmy mind does not work in that direction. A. I have come here for this. I want to request you to give up civil disobedience and to join the Round Table Conference. The point is that if you do not come, we shall get nothing in England and everything will be upset. People like Iqbal who are enemies of the country will come to the forefront. We have to work any sort of constitution. Hence though I am a small man, I request you to come. G. If you elaborate your argument, I shall think over it. I suggest you go and write about it at length in the newspapers. I shall think over it. A. It is not a thing that can be put down in writing. In it I shall have to say a lot that will hurt the Muslims and I cannot say that publicly. But I shall write anonymously or have someone write in a different way. Please have a look at it and, taking it to be mine, think over it.

G. It will be good if you write under your own name. But of course you may do as you wish. A. I must honestly say that I have no interest in the temples being thrown open, common dinners and the like, because we suffer thereby. My people have to put up with beatings and bitterness increases. After the common dinner at Vile Parle, the Maratha workers went on strike. If the caste Hindus had the strength they would have engaged untouchables as servants. But that has not been so. Hence I do not feel interested in the thing. I only want that social and economic hardships should end. G. Give examples. A. The untouchables do not get houses to live in; they continue to suffer injustice and oppression. In one case, an untouchable was accused of having murdered a Maratha. I could have taken the case to Sessions and got him acquitted, but the magistrate changed the charge of murder to one of grievous injury. Now he will receive some punishment. You may not know what even I have to face. I do not get any other place to live in Bombay except the Port Trust chawl. In my village, I have to stay in the midst of the Mahars. In Poona, all others stay with their friends. I have to stay at the National Hotel and have to spend Rs. 7 and transport fare. G. Servants of India? A. Yes, I can perhaps stay there. But only perhaps. You will know if you ask Vaze. Once Vazes servant insulted me in his presence. I want to do away with all these hardships. G. I am at one with you. You ought to know that my fast has not ended yet, it is still on. To correct the agreement was a minor thing. The main thing still remains to be done. I am ready to give my life for it. All the injustices you mention ought to end. A. Birla said that I should be taken on the Committee for the Abolition of Untouchability. I declined to join, because what can I alone do? I would have to agree to the work of abolishing untouchability being done in accordance with your wishes. If we are in a majority we can get the reforms that we wish brought about. You wish that temples should be erected or wells should be dug. We might feel that that would be a waste of money that there should be another way out for it. G. I understand your point of view, and I shall keep it in mind and shall see what can be done.

(Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi-Vol. 57: 5 SEPTEMBER, 1932 - 15 NOVEMBER, 1932)

Letter to B. R. Ambedkar, February 16, 1933 DEAR DR. AMBEDKAR, I thank you for your letter of the 12th instant enclosing your statement. I did not receive anything from the Associated Press, but I saw it in the daily Press. I hope you saw my reply. I wish that you could appreciate my viewpoint. Yours sincerely, From a microfilm: S.N. 20265

Associated Press, 14-2-1933 (Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi- Mahadevbhaini Diary, Vol. II, pp. 144 6[From Gujarati])

Discussion with B. R. Ambedkar, February 4, 1933 Discussing the propriety or otherwise of Ranga Iyers two Bills [Ambedkar] said: The oneparagraph Bill is a very simple one. Its fair point lies in admitting that this custom is immoral. There is no such admission in the second Bill. BAPU: No, it is there in its preamble. A. But it is not clear.... I also think that the two Bills do not go together... BAPU: The one-paragraph Bill is certainly superior to the other. But the other lengthier Bill was brought forward because the first one could not be introduced in the Provincial Legislature. There is no contradiction in the two Bills. In one Bill untouchability ceases to be a disability and the law refuses to accept the argument based on untouchability. As a result of the second Bill, temple authorities are obliged to take steps under certain circumstances. If we can get both the Bills passed the trustees will not be able to put up any kind of

obstacle. I take it upon myself to have all the temples opened within one month if we could get both the Bills passed. The sanatanists would prefer the second Bill. But speaking as a sincere sanatanist I would prefer the first Bill. A. ...Now the Government will have to issue orders against the sanatanists under Section 144 because they would be regarded as interfering with untouchables rights. BAPU: However, I want you now to emphatically proclaim your ideas in very clear words. A. ...As far as we are concerned we have no immediate concern other than securing political power... and that alone is the solution of our problem... We want our social status raised in the eyes of the savarna Hindus. There is another point of view also. The object of this effort could be that you want the depressed classes to be retained in the Hindu religion, in which case I am inclined to believe that it is not sufficient in the present awakened state of the depressed classes... If I call myself a Hindu I am obliged to accept that by birth I belong to a low caste. Hence I think I must ask the Hindus to show me some sacred authority, which would rule out this feeling of lowliness. If it cannot be I should say goodbye to Hinduism... I am not going to be satisfied with measures, which would merely bring some relief... I dont want to be crushed by your charity. BAPU: I have nothing to say if you have come with a final decision that you are not going to move your little finger to have this Bill passed. A. We have not made any decision. However, I have shown you how my mind is working. BAPU: I told you that I could have nothing to say if you have already taken a decision. A. We cannot ask the savarna Hindus to decide for themselves whether or not we are a part of them. You ought to demonstrate your determination by getting these Bills passed. BAPU: I am not asking you to do anything. I never wanted the depressed people to go on their knees to the savarna Hindus and ask them to get these Bills passed. Unfortunately, the solution of this problem is in the hands of a third power, which is in a position to mend or worsen the situation. A. I can set right the thing. BAPU: That is right. Of course I agree with you that it does not behove your dignity to approach the Hindus. I take the positionyou might remember since I made the speech at

the Round Table Conferencethat we should atone for this. If you repudiate us and go away I would think that we only deserved it. A. The Bill mentions temple-entry but it makes no mention of entry into the sanctum sanctorum. Will they let a member of the depressed community place flowers on the idol, or will they let him offer a tray containing oblations? Malaviyaji has already declared that question of offering puja does not arise. BAPU: Temple-entry is meant for puja if anything. But if the language of the Bill is not right it can be amended and we can say entry for the purpose of puja. It seems there has been some misunderstanding somewhere in the case of Malaviyaji. He would not say what you attribute to him. Flowers, sweets or any other offerings from Harijans will surely be accepted. So we two agree on this point that there is no question of your imploring the savarna Hindus. When some savarna Hindus tell me that Harijans do not want to enter the temples I ask them to throw open the temple doors for the Harijans whether or not they wish to come in. They ought to have the satisfaction that they have done their duty. They ought to discharge the debt, which they owe whether the creditor keeps it or throws it into the gutter. But I must say that you ought not to say that you are not a Hindu. In accepting the Poona Pact you accept the position that you are Hindus. A. I have accepted only the political aspect of it. BAPU: You cannot escape the situation that you are Hindus in spite of your statement to the contrary. A. We ask of you that our silence should not be misconstrued. After that I accept your point. BAPU: I go one step further. You will not be able to go ahead a single step unless you maintain your position absolutely correct. I regard temple-entry as a spiritual matter through which everything else will bear fruit. A. The Hindu mind does not work in a rational way. They have no objection to the untouchables touching them on the railway and other public places. Why do they object to it only in the case of temples? BAPU: We are well caught on this point. I take up the question of temple-entry first of all because these people want to cling to untouchability in the temples. Many sanatanist Hindus say that they would admit Harijans in schools and public places but not in temples. I ask

them to grant the Harijans equal status before God. It will raise their status. A. Supposing we are lucky in the case of temple-entry, will they let us fetch water from the wells? BAPU: Sure. This is bound to follow it. And it is also very easy. (Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi- APPENDIX X VOL. 59: 13 JANUARY 1933 - 9 MARCH 1933) [From Gujarati] Mahadevbhaini Diary, Vol. III, pp. 117-22 Vide Dr. Ambedkar and Caste, 7-2-1933

Letter to B. R. Ambedkar, April 27, 1933 DEAR DR, AMBEDKAR, In accordance with my promise I send you herewith my opinion on your proposal. I hope you do not mind my having dealt with the matter publicly. I thought that the issue raised by you was of such momentous importance that if I discussed it at all, I should do so publicly. Yours sincerely, Enclosure From a photostat: S.N. 21074 (Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi- VOL. 61: 27 APRIL, 1933- 7 OCTOBER 193)

Volume 63 Letter to B. R. Ambedkar AS AT PATNA, April 9, 1934

DEAR DR. AMBEDKAR, Pray excuse me for the delay in replying to your letter of 29-3-1934. It was not possible to reply earlier owing to incessant traveling. Whilst I should fall in with your scheme if it was accepted by the provinces, I could not shoulder the burden of pressing the other provinces to reopen the Pact in respect of the number of seats allotted in their cases. I have been trying to do what I can to placate Bengal, but so far without success. If the Harijan population in Bengal is as was believed at the time of the Pact they have nothing to complain of. If as a matter of fact it is much less than the figure on whose basis the number was fixed, I should think there would be no objection on your part to an amendment bringing the number to the figure required. Yours sincerely, M. K. GANDHI

From a copy: C. W. 7949. Courtesy: G. D. Birla

Volume 64

Interview to B. R. Ambedkar BOMBAY, June 16, 1934 In the afternoon Dr. Ambedkar interviewed Gandhiji along with Dr. Solanki and other friends of his. Gandhiji asked Dr. Ambedkar for a criticism of the work of the Harijan Sevak Sangh. The worthy Doctor suggested that the Sangh might economize on education and medical relief, as these were attended to by Government and there was a risk of duplication of effort in these matters. Again, education, in the first place, only benefited the individual; whether it would benefit society or not would depend upon what attitude the educated individual took up towards society. He would like the Sangh to concentrate on the primary object of securing full civic rights for Harijans, such as the right to draw water from public wells and to send children to public schools, without any discrimination being exercised against them. As regards cases of maltreatment of Harijans by villagers, such as those adduced by Dr. Ambedkar, Gandhiji said the Sangh was bound to deal with them. In fact, steps had actually been taken in numerous cases with more or less success. But in future Gandhiji would be

glad if the Doctor was good enough to send him full facts about every incident of that description. In course of his tour of villages he had noticed that a change for the better was coming over them, but progress in that direction would be accelerated if he had the Doctors valued co-operation. As regards education, Gandhiji did not think there was overlapping. In fact, the Sangh was unable to cope with the whole demand, as the right type of teachers was not readily available. Harijan, 29-6-1934 G. V. Naik, Amritrao Khambe and Baburao Gaekwad.

Volume 67

Letter to B. R. Ambedkar WARDHA, July 9, 1935 DEAR DR. AMBEDKAR, As you may know, Rajaram Bhole is with me just now. He wants me to advise him as to the course he should take. Regard being had as to his precarious health; I have advised that it would be better if he could reconcile himself to some Harijan service against... to feed and clothe himself. The other alternative is to take up a business line. I see difficulties in his taking it up. He must then attend regular hours and be prepared to do best work, which is fatal for a man who is in perpetual fear of developing active T.B. But I told him that he should take your advice and be guided by you. He tells me he has already written to you. I know he will receive your reply in due course. But I would like you, for my sake, please, to hasten your reply so as to enable me to tell Rajaram what to do. Yours sincerely,

From a copy: Pyarelal Papers. Courtesy: Pyarelal

TELEGRAM TO B. R. AMBEDKAR

ANANDKUNJ, RAJKOT, April 14, 1939 DOCTOR AMBEDKAR, M. L. A. BOMBAY SO FAR AS I CAN SEE AT LEAST FOUR MEMBERS WILL FULLY REPRESENT DEPRESSED CLASS INTERESTS. NAMES BEING CHOSEN BY SARDAR. GANDHI

From a copy: C. W. 10176. Courtesy: D. B. Kalelkar

Letter to B. R. Ambedkar SEVAGRAM, August 6, 1944 Thank you for yours of July 31 received yesterday. The Hindu-Muslim question is for me a lifelong question. There was a time when I used to think that when that question was solved Indias political troubles would be over. Experience has taught me that it was only partly true. Untouchability I began to abhor when I was in my teens, but it was a question with me of religious and social reform. And though it has attained a great political importance its religious and social value is for me much greater. But I know to my cost that you and I hold different views on this very important question. And I know, too, that on broad politics of the country we see things from different angles. I would love to find a meeting ground between us on both the questions. I know your great ability and I would love to own you as a colleague and co-worker. But I must admit my failure to come nearer to you. If you can show me a way to a common meeting ground between us I would like to see it. Meanwhile, I must reconcile myself to the present unfortunate difference. (Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi- Volume 84)

The Bombay Chronicle, 3-1-1945 Vide Appendix A Resolution, before 9-8-1944.

Which inter alia read: ...the Hindu-Muslim problem is not the only communal problem that has to be settled... there is a communal problem between the Hindus and the untouchables, which is also awaiting solution... An all-round settlement between the Hindus and other minorities, I am sure, will become necessary if Indias political goal is to be achieved... But, if you are anxious to solve the Hindu-untouchable problem as you are to solve the HinduMuslim problem, I shall be glad to formulate points on which a settlement is necessary...

Gandhi & Ambedkar - A comparative study by Ramachandra Guha.

'Inside every thinking Indian there is a Gandhian and a Marxist struggling for supremacy,' says noted historian and biographer RAMACHANDRA GUHA in the opening sentence of this publication, which has just been released. A significant portion of the book expands on this salvo. In short, it examines and discusses all those who comprise the life of thinking Indians today. Exclusive extracts from the book released yesterday . MAHATMA GANDHI was not so much the Father of the Nation as the mother of all debates regarding its future. All his life he fought in a friendly spirit with compatriots whose views on this or that topic diverged sharply from his. He disagreed with Communists and the bhadralok on the efficacy and morality of violence as a political strategy. He fought with radical Muslims on the one side and with radical Hindus on the other, both of whom sought to build a state on theological principles. He argued with Nehru and other scientists on whether economic development in a free India should centre on the village or the factory. And with that other giant, Rabindranath Tagore, he disputed the merits of such varied affiliations as the English language, nationalism, and the spinning wheel. In some ways the most intense, interesting and long-running of these debates was between Gandhi and Ambedkar. Gandhi wished to save Hinduism by abolishing untouchability, whereas Ambedkar saw a solution for his people outside the fold of the dominant religion of the Indian people. Gandhi was a rural romantic, who wished to make the self-governing village the bedrock of free India; Ambedkar an admirer of city life and modern technology who dismissed the Indian village as a den of iniquity. Gandhi was a crypto-anarchist who favoured non-violent protest while being suspicious of the state; Ambedkar a steadfast constitutionalist, who worked within the state and sought solutions to social problems with the aid of the state. Perhaps the most telling difference was in the choice of political instrument. For Gandhi, the Congress represented all of India, the Dalits too. Had he not made their cause their own from the time of his first ashram in South Africa? Ambedkar however made a clear distinction between freedom and power. The Congress wanted the British to transfer power to them, but to obtain freedom the Dalits had to organise themselves as a separate bloc, to form a separate party, so as to more effectively articulate their interests in the crucible of electoral politics. It was thus that in his lifetime, and for long afterwards, Ambedkar came to represent a dangerously subversive threat to the authoritative, and sometimes authoritarian, equation: Gandhi = Congress = Nation. Here then is the stuff of epic drama, the argument between the Hindu who did most to reform caste and the exHindu who did most to do away with caste altogether. Recent accounts represent it as a fight between a hero and a villain, the writer's caste position generally determining who gets cast as hero, who as villain. In truth both figures should be seen as heroes, albeit tragic ones. The tragedy, from Gandhi's point of view, was that his colleagues in the national movement either did not understand his concern with untouchability or even actively deplored it. Priests and motley shankaracharyas thought he was going too fast in his challenge to caste - and why did he not first take their permission? Communists wondered why he wanted everyone to clean their own latrines when he could be speaking of class struggle. And Congressmen in general thought Harijan work came in the way of an all-out effort for national freedom. Thus Stanley Reid, a former editor of the Times of India quotes an Indian patriot who complained in the late thirties that "Gandhi is wrapped up in the Harijan movement. He does not care a jot whether we live or die; whether we are bond or free." The opposition that he faced from his fellow Hindus meant that Gandhi had perforce to move slowly, and in stages. He started by accepting that untouchability was bad, but added a cautionary caveat - that inter-dining and inter-marriage were also bad. He moved on to accepting inter-mingling and inter-dining (hence the

movement for temple entry), and to arguing that all men and all varnas were equal. The last and most farreaching step, taken only in 1946, was to challenge caste directly by accepting and sanctioning inter-marriage itself. The tragedy, from Ambedkar's point of view, was that to fight for his people he had to make common cause with the British. In his book, Worshipping False Gods, Arun Shourie has made much of this. Shourie takes all of 600 pages to make two points: (i) that Ambedkar was a political opponent of both Gandhi and the Congress, and generally preferred the British to either; (ii) that Ambedkar cannot be called the "Father of the Constitution" as that implies sole authorship, whereas several other people, such as K. M. Munshi and B. N. Rau, also contributed significantly to the wording of the document. Reading Worshipping False Gods, one might likewise conclude that it has been mistakenly advertised as being the work of one hand. Entire chapters are based entirely on one or other volume of the Transfer of Power, the collection of official papers put out some years ago by Her Majesty's Stationery Office. The editor of that series, Nicholas Mansergh, might with reason claim coauthorship of Shourie's book. In a just world he would be granted a share of the royalties too. Practised in the arts of over-kill and over-quote, Shourie is a pamphleteer parading as a historian. He speaks on Gandhi only as "Gandhiji" and of the national movement only as the "National Movement", indicating that he has judged the case beforehand. For to use the suffix and the capitals is to simultaneously elevate and intimidate, to set up the man and his movement as the ideal, above and beyond criticism. But the Congress' claim to represent all of India was always under challenge. The Communists said it was the party of landlords and capitalists. The Muslim League said it was a party of the Hindus. Ambedkar then appended a devastating caveat, saying that the party did not even represent all Hindus, but only the upper castes. Shourie would deny that these critics had any valid arguments whatsoever. He is in the business of awarding, and more often withholding, certificates of patriotism. The opponents of the Congress are thus all suspect to him, simply because they dared point out that the National Movement was not always as national as it set out to be, or that the Freedom Struggle promised unfreedom for some. But how did these men outside the Congress come to enjoy such a wide following? This is a question Shourie does not pause to answer, partly because he had made up his mind in advance, but also because he is woefully ill-informed. Consider now some key facts erased or ignored by him. That Ambedkar preferred the British to the Congress is entirely defensible. Relevant here is a remark of the 18thCentury English writer Samuel Johnson. When the American colonists asked for independence from Britain, Johnson said: "How is it that we hear the greatest yelps for liberty among the drivers of Negroes?" Untouchability was to the Indian freedom movement what slavery had been to the American struggle, the basic contradiction it sought to paper over. Before Ambedkar, another outstanding leader of the lower castes, Jotiba Phule, also distrusted the Congress, in his time a party dominated by Poona Brahmins. He too preferred the British, in whose armies and factories low castes could find opportunities denied to them in the past. The opening up of the economy and the growth of the colonial cities also helped many untouchables escape the tyranny of the village. The British might have been unwitting agents of change; nonetheless, under their rule life for the lower castes was less unpleasant by far than it had been under the Peshwas. Shourie also seems unaware of work by worthy historians on low- caste movements in other parts of India. Mark Juergensmeyer has documented the struggles of untouchables in Punjab, which under its remarkable leader Mangu Ram, rejected the Congress and the Arya Samaj to form a new sect, Adi-Dharm, which was opposed to both. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay has written of the Namasudras in Bengal, who like Ambedkar and his Mahars, were not convinced that a future Congress government would be sympathetic to their interests. And countless scholars have documented the rise of the Dravidian movement in South India, that took as its point of departure Brahmin domination of the Congress in Madras: the movement's founder, E. V. Ramaswami "Periyar", also fought bitterly with Gandhi. The leaders of these movements, and the millions who followed them, worked outside the Congress and often in opposition to it. Enough reason perhaps for Shourie to dismiss them all as anti- national. Indeed, Shourie's attitude is comparable to that of White Americans who question the patriotism of those Blacks who dare speak out against racism. For asking Blacks to stand up for their rights, men of such stature as W.E.B. Du Bois and Paul Robeson were called all kind of names, of which "anti-American" was much the politest. Later, the great Martin Luther King was persecuted by the most powerful of American agencies, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, whose director, J. Edgar Hoover, equated patriotism with acquiescence to White domination. Much of the time, Shourie writes as if there is a singular truth, with him as its repository and guarantor. Time and again he equates Ambedkar with Jinnah as an "accomplice of Imperial politics". He dismisses all that Ambedkar wrote about Hinduism "caricature" and "calumnies". Not once does he acknowledge that there was much truth to

the criticisms. There is not one admission here of the horrendous and continuing sufferings of Dalit as the hands of caste Hindus that might explain and justify Ambedkar's rhetoric and political choices. For Shourie, the fact that Ambedkar disagreed long and often with Gandhi is proof enough that he was anti-national. He even insinuates that Ambedkar "pushed Gandhi to the edge of death" by not interfering with the Mahatma's decision to fast in captivity. Of the same fast other historians have written, in my view more plausibly, that by threatening to die Gandhi blackmailed Ambedkar into signing a pact with him. Somewhere in the middle of Worshipping False Gods, the author complains that Ambedkar's "statues, dressed in garish blue, holding a copy of the Constitution - have been put up in city after city." However, this aesthetic distaste seems rather pointless. For the background to the statues and the reverence they command lies in the continuing social practices of the religion to which Shourie and I belong. If caste lives, so will the memory of the man who fought to annihilate it. The remarkable thing is that 50 years after independence, the only politician, dead or alive, who has a truly pan-Indian appeal is B. R. Ambedkar. Where Gandhi is forgotten in his native Gujarat and Nehru vilified in his native Kashmir, Ambedkar is worshipped in hamlets all across the land. For Dalits everywhere he is the symbol of their struggle, the scholar, theoretician and activist whose own life represented a stirring triumph over the barriers of caste. Shourie's attacks on Dalits and their hero follow in quick succession the books he has published attacking Communists, Christians and Muslims. Truth be told, the only category of Indians he has not attacked - and going by his present political persuasion will not attack - are high-caste Hindus. Oddly enough, this bilious polemicist and baiter of the minorities was once an anti-religious leftist who excoriated Hinduism. To see Shourie's career in its totality is to recall these words of Issac Deutscher, on the communist turned anti-communist. He brings to his job the lack of scruple, the narrow-mindedness, the disregard of truth, and the intense hatred with which Stalinism has imbued him. He remains sectarian. He is an inverted Stalinist. He continues to see the world in black and white, but now the colours are differently distributed ... The ex- communist ... is haunted by a vague sense that he has betrayed either his former ideals or the ideals of bourgeois society ... He then tries to suppress the guilt and uncertainty, or to camouflage it by a show of extraordinary certitude and frantic aggressiveness. He insists that the world should recognise his uneasy conscience as the clearest conscience of all. He may no longer be concerned with any cause except one - self- justification. Ambedkar is a figure who commands great respect from one end of the social spectrum. But he is also, among some non-Dalits, an object of great resentment, chiefly for his decision to carve out a political career independent of and sometimes in opposition to Gandhi's Congress. That is of course the burden of Shourie's critique but curiously, the very week his book was published, at a political rally in Lucknow the Samajvadi Party's Beni Prasad Verma likewise dismissed Ambedkar as one who "did nothing else except create trouble for Gandhiji". This line, that Ambedkar had no business to criticise, challenge or argue with Gandhi, was of course made with much vigour and malice during the national movement as well. I think, however, that for Ambedkar to stand up to the uncrowned king and anointed Mahatma of the Indian people required extraordinary courage and will-power. Gandhi thought so too. Speaking at a meeting in Oxford in October 1931, Gandhi said he had "the highest regard for Dr. Ambedkar. He has every right to be bitter. That he does not break our heads is an act of self- restraint on his part." Writing to an English friend two years later, he said he found "nothing unnatural" in Ambedkar's hostility to the Congress and its supporters. "He has not only witnessed the inhuman wrongs done to the social pariahs of Hinduism", reflected this Hindu, "but in spite of all his culture, all the honours that he has received, he has, when he is in India, still to suffer many insults to which untouchables are exposed." In June 1936 Gandhi pointed out once again that Dr. Ambedkar "has had to suffer humiliations and insults which should make any one of us bitter and resentful." "Had I been in his place," he remarked, "I would have been as angry." Gandhi's latter-day admirers might question Ambedkar's patriotism and probity, but the Mahatma had no such suspicions himself. Addressing a bunch of Karachi students in June 1934, he told them that "the magnitude of (Dr. Ambedkar's) sacrifice is great. He is absorbed in his own work. He leads a simple life. He is capable of earning one to two thousand rupees a month. He is also in a position to settle down in Europe if he so desires. But he does not want to stay there. He is only concerned about the welfare of the Harijians." To Gandhi, Ambedkar's protest held out a lesson to the upper castes. In March 1936 he said that if Ambedkar and his followers were to embrace another religion, "We deserve such treatment and our task (now) is to wake up to the situation and purify ourselves." Not many heeded the warning, for towards the end of his life Gandhi spoke with some bitterness about the indifference to Harijan work among his fellow Hindus: "The tragedy is that those who should have especially devoted themselves to the work of (caste) reform did not put their hearts into it. What wonder that Harijan brethren feel suspicious, and show opposition and bitterness."

The words quoted in the preceding paragraphs have been taken from that reliable and easily accessible source: the Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi. The 100 volumes of that set rest lightly on my shelves as, going by other evidence, they rest on the shelves of the man who compiled Worshipping False Gods. Perhaps the most perverse aspect of an altogether perverse book is that Shourie does not once tell us what Gandhi said or wrote about his great adversary. A curious thing or, on reflection, a not-so-curious thing: for if that scholarly courtesy was restored to, the case that Ambedkar was an anti-national careerist would be blown sky- high. One of the few Gandhians who understood the cogency of the Dalit critique of the Congress was C. Rajagopalachari. In the second half of 1932, Rajaji became involved in the campaign to allow the so-called untouchables to enter the Guruvayoor temple in Kerala. The campaign was led by that doughty fighter for the rights of the dispossessed, K. Kelappan Nair. In a speech at Guruvayoor on December 20, 1932, Rajaji told the high castes that it would certainly help us in the fight for Swaraj if we open the doors of the temple (to Harijans). One of the many causes that keeps Swaraj away from us is that we are divided among ourselves. Mahatmaji received many wounds in London (during the Second Round Table Conference of 1931). But Dr. Ambedkar's darts were the worst. Mahatmaji did not quake before the Churchills of England. But as repressing the nation he had to plead guilty to Dr. Ambedkar's charges. As it was, the managers of temples across the land could count upon the support of many among their clientele, the suvarna Hindus who agreed with the Shankaracharyas that the Gandhians were dangerous revolutionaries who had to be kept out at the gate. Unhappily, while upper-caste Hindus thought that Gandhi moved too fast, Dalits today feel he was much too slow. The Dalit politician Mayawati has, more than once, spoken of the Mahatma as a shallow paternalist who sought only to smooth the path for more effective long-term domination by the suvarna. Likewise, in his book Why I am Not a Hindu Kancha Illiah writes of Gandhi as wanting to "build a modern consent system for the continued maintenance of brahminical hegemony" - a judgment as unfair as Shourie's on Ambedkar. Whereas in their lifetime Gandhi and Ambedkar were political rivals, now, decades after their death, it should be possible to see their contributions as complementing one another's. The Kannada critic D. R. Nagaraj once noted that in the narratives of Indian nationalism the "heroic stature of the caste-Hindu reformer", Gandhi, "further dwarfed the Harijan personality" of Ambedkar. In the Ramayana there is only one hero but, as Nagaraj points out, Ambedkar was too proud, intelligent and self- respecting a man to settle for the role of Hanuman or Sugreeva. By the same token, Dalit hagiographers and pamphleteers generally seek to elevate Ambedkar by diminishing Gandhi. For the scriptwriter and the mythmaker there can only be one hero. But the historian is bound by no such constraint. The history of Dalit emancipation is unfinished, and for the most part unwritten. It should, and will, find space for many heroes. Ambedkar and Gandhi will do nicely for a start. An Anthropologist Among The Marxists And Other Essays, Ramachandra Guha, Permanent Black 2001, New Delhi, Rs. 450. Ramachandra Guha is a historian, biographer and cricket writer. Once a visiting professor at Stanford University, Oslo University and the University of California at Berkeley, he is now a full- time writer based in Bangalore. His books include The Unquiet Woods and Environmentalism: A Global History. He is the editor of the forthcoming Picador Book of Cricket