Dr. Ambedkar and the Mahar Movement

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69-21,466 ZELLIOT, Eleanor Mae, 1926DR. A M B E D K A R A N D TH E M A H A R M O V E MENT. University of Pennsylvania, Ph.D., 1969 History, m o d e m

U niversity M icrofilm s, Inc., A n n A rbor, M ichigan

@ COPYRIGHT Eleanor Mae Zelliot 1970

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DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE MAHAR MOVEMENT Eleanor Mae Zelliot

A DISSERTATION in South Asia Regional Studies

Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 1969

Supervisor of Dissertation

Graduate Group Chairman

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INDEX

Ad-Dharm, 51, 170, 258 Adi-Dravida, 6, 51, 68, 143-4, 152, 157, 168n Agarkar, Gopal Ganesh, 45-6, 67, 74, 101 All-Religions Conference, 214-27 Ambedkar, Bhimrao Ramji, forces shaping life, 4-5, army back­ ground, 83-4, education, 84-92, marriages, 85, 232, in Baroda, 86, 90, 93; attitudes on temple entry, 107-17, 120, on mass movement, 128, on Indian inde­ pendence, 138, 175-6, on Hindu­ ism, 197-9, 202, 203-4, 212-3, 227-8, on Buddhism, 199, 229-32, 234; his newspapers, 117-21, his circle, 129-31, dual role, 172-4; testimony to Southbor. ough Committee, 81-3, 150-2, to Simon Commission, 170-2, at Round Table Conferences, 174-81; on Viceroy's Council, 2S3-5, in Constituent Assembly, 267-70, as Law Minister, 268, 270, in Rajya Sabha, 269n, 274-5, death,10, 238-9. See also Bombay Legislative Assembly, Bombay Legislative Council, Depressed Classes Institute, Indian Labour Party, Poona Pact, Republican Party, Scheduled Castes Federa­ tion, passim. Ambedkar, Ramabai, 85, 232 Ambedkar, Savita, 232, 234n Ambedkar, Yeshwant, 85, 240, 291 Anarya Doshparihar (or Doshpariharak or Doshpariharakham) Mandali, 50, 58-9 Apte, Hari Narayan, 46, 153 Army, 2, 3, 4, 15, 33, 38, 41, 52-60, 69-71, 83-4, 85, 101, 121n, 141, 158n, 264 Arya Samaj, 42n, 215, 215n, 217 Aryan, Untouchables as pre-, 49-51, 58, 70, 151

Bagade, Bapuji Namdeo, 145 Bakhale, R.R., 132 Balu, P. (or Baloo), 133, 182, 186, 188, 206, 251-2 balutedar, 19, 21, 166; in Vidarbha 40-1, 108n Bansode, Kisan Fagoji (or Bansod), 44-5, 69, 73-80, 81, 94, 119, 121, 146n, 206 Baroda, Gaikwad of, 48, 85n, 86, 86n, 89, 92, 142, 147 Bhakti movement, 14, 16, 27, 29, 34, 58, 60-9, 118, 234-5, 236, Bhandare, R.D., 298 Bhandari (caste), 160 Bhandarkar, R.G., 45, 50n, 67 Bhangi (caste), 23, 68n, 299 Bhatkar, P.N. (or Bhatkai), 118, 155 Bhave, Vinoba, 299 Bhole, R.R., 225, 251, 264n Bhopatkar, L.B., 110, llln Birla, G.D., 190n, 233n Bole, S.K., 85, 100, 105, 160-1 Bombay Government, 47-8, 154-5 Bombay Legislative Assembly, 246, 249, 252-6 Bombay Legislative Council, 72, 158-66, 171, 281n Brahman, 19, 24-5, 26, 27n, 28 42, 54, 62, 63, 64, 66, 69n, 70, 74, 82, 84, 99, 109, 111, 112, 114, 119, 123, 124, 129, 130, 148n, 152, 153-4, 178, 276; Chitpavan Brahman (caste), 58, 211

Brahmo Samaj, 42n Buddhism, 1, 9, 10, 18n. 51, 85, 199, 214, 218-20, 229-30, 23141, 289; Buddha, 199, 214, 219, 230; in South India, 143, 209-10, 235; Buddhist Society of India, 291-2 Chambhar (caste), 18, 25, 31-2, 33 39, 52, 55, 57, 61, 103, 106-7, 122-3, 132-4, 182, 251-2, 271

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iv

Chandavarkar, N.R. , 145, 147, 158, 159n Chandraseniya Kayastha Frabhu (or C.K.P.) (caste), 52, 100, 101, 130-1, 245n , 250 Chaurasia, S.D. Singh, 280 Chavan, Yeshwantrao, 278, 297 Chitre, A.V., 101, 131n Chitre, K.V., 13In Christian Church, 6, 13, 42, 68n, 79, 110, 162, 168n, 169n, 181, 204, 215, 227; conversion to, 29-30, 71, 75n, 181, 199-200, 201n, 206, 209, 213, 214, 216, 217-8 Cokhamela, 14, 16n, 21n, , 60-5, 67, 68, 69, 75, 76, 79, 112, 121, 196, 234-5 conferences, 6, 76, 77-8, 94-107, 175-6, 184-5, 202-3, 211-14, 243, 258-9 Congress, Indian National, 16, 57, 59, 94, 110-1, 112, 115-6, 135, 138, 145-6, 154, 167, 176, 181, 189, 190, 191, 244, 248, 252, 253, 254, 255, 256, 265, 269, 270, 272, 273, 274, 278, 279, 294, 297,298 conversion, 30, 59, 79, 93, 110-1, 113, 117, 136, 181, 199-200, 202-34, 242. See also Buddhism, Christian Church, Muslims, Sikhs. Cripps, Stafford, 258, 266 Depressed Classes Association, -168n, 183 Depressed Classes Institute (or • Bahishkrit Hitakarini Sabha), 97, 121-9, l-68n, 182 Depressed Classes Mission Society, 44, 46, 144-5, 146, 147, 148, 158 Depressed India Association, 82, 121-2, 144, 146, 149 Deshmukh, Panjabrao, 108 Dewey, John, 87-8, 151 Dhed (caste), 122, 144, 146 Donde, M.V., 130, 264 Dougre, Rai Bahadur, 146n, 147

education, 6, 29, 34, 37, 38, 41, 42-9, 71, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 84-90, 91, 92, 94, 105, 106, 108, 117, 118n, 119, 123-4, 125. 128-9, 160-1, 164-5, 230, 234n, 248, 289; Hartog Committee on, 162 Elphinstone, Mountstuart, 29, 47 Gadgil, N.V., 109, 114, 226 Gaikwad, B.K. (Dadasaheb), 51n, 113, 114, 116, 128n, 211, 251, 263-4, 265, 294 Gandhi, Mohandas K. (Mahatma), 46 67, 93-9, 107, 112, 133, 137, 174, 176, 177, 178-90, 191-5, 198, 201, 203-4, 209, 216, 224-5, 244, 263n, 265, 273, 276, 284, 296, 298, 299 Gawai, G.A., 74, 76, 82, 108, 146n, 148-50, 169-70, 188 Ghatge, R.S., 59, 72, 109, 164 Gholap, D.D. 53, 118n, 158-9 Godbole, Waman, 235 Gok’ nale, Gopal Krishna, 45, 46n, 67, 130, 159, 277 Harijan, 191-3, 254, 267; Harijan sevak Sangh, 190, 192, 193 Hindu Code Bill, 270 Hindu Mahasabha, All-India, 75, 103n, llln, 134, 186n, 207-8, 224 Independent Labour Party, 243-57, 265 Iravas (caste), 6, 143, 208-10, 295 Jadhav, B.V., 153, 176n Jadhav, D.G., 38n, 251 Jadhav, D.M. (Madkebhua), 130n Jadhav, M.K., 86n, 162-3, 164 Jatav (caste), 168n, 258n, 267n Jayakar, M.R., 86n, 111, 186, 208, 224, 261 Jedhe, K.M., lOln, 109 Jinnah, Muhammad Ali, 157, 256, 263n Joshi, N.M., 132, 153, 176n

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Joshi, S.M., 109

Maharashtra, as state, 11, geo­ graphical divisions, 11, social Kabir Panth, 28-9, 230 structure 13-5, British in, Kadam, Krlshnaji S., 103 15-6, as country of Kahais, 79, Kadam, V.B., 87-8 Christian Church in, 29-30, Kadrekar, Bhaskarrso, 130, 131n elite attitude toward Gandhi, Kajrolkar, N.S., 182, 207, 271 194-5, united, 275-8, 293 Kamble, B.C., 272 Malaviya, Madan Mohan, 75, 110, Kamble, Shivram Janba, 38, 44, 154, 186, 207-8, 224 58, 59, 69-73, 79-80, 81, 94, Mandal, Jogendranath, 267 96, 109, 119, 121, 140-1, 252 Mang (caste), 18, 26, 31, 32, 33, Kausalyayan, Anand, 238-9 39, 52, 67, 109, 122, 132-3, Kelkar, N.C., 111, 153, 207 134, 290, 295 Keluskar, K.A., 85, 229 Mann, Harold H., 19n, 36-8, 72 Keshavsut, 24-5 Manusmriti, 103-4, 105, 106, 1-29, Khairmoday, C.B. (or Khairmode), 170, 205-6 164, 290 Maratha (caste), 12, 14n, 16, 17 Kharat, Shankarrao, 290, 297 19, 36, 43, 44, 51, 52, 54, 55, 56, 58, 91, 112, 123, 134-5, 145 Kher, B.G., 115. 123, 129n, 252-3 150, 153-4, 181, 276-8 Khoti system, 247, 254-5, 282; Khoti Sabha, 252 Masur^ar Maharaj, 210—1 Mate, A.M., 98n, 163 Kolhapur, Maharaja of, 15, 43, 91-2, 96, 132 Medhe, S.N., 124, 164 Kosambi, Dharmanana, 230 Mehta,'Ashok, 273 Moonje, B.S. (or Moonji), 67, 184, Kothari, Walchand Ramchandra (or V.R.), 146n, 153 186, 189, 208, 224-5 Muslims, 5, 13, 54, 55, 56, 71, 76 Krishnajee, Gangaram, 59, 70 79, 93, 99, 101, 110, 138, 139, Kshatriya status, 12, 49, 51-2, 70 141, 142-3, 150, 170, 171, 176-7 Kulkarni, A.R , 250 178, 180, 187n, 188, 206, 211-2, Kunbi (caste), 12n, 34, 255 216, 227, 262-3; and conversion, Kurtakoti, Dr. (Shankaracharya), 75n, 111, 181, 199-200, 206, 210 208-10, 225 213, 214-5, 218, 220-2, 228, 263 labor unions, 131-2, 255 Muslim League, 244-5, 252, 256, Lohia, Rammanohar, 281 260-1, 267 Lokanatha, 219-20 Naik, Deorao, 130 Namashudra (caste), 6, 144, 154, Mahanubhava (sect), 28, 273 163n, 171 Mahar (caste), numbers, 17-8, potNarasu, P. Lakshmi, 231 jats, 13, 18, 77; 96. proverbs Narayana Guru, Sri, 6, 209 on, 25-6, urbanization, 35-9, Nariman, G.K., 123 occupational change, 15, 33, 41 Nehru, Jawaharlal, 230, 273, 286n, 56, 78, and other castes, 31-2, 299 132-6, attitude toward Ambedkar, Nehru, Motilal, 154, 175 7, 193-4, 195. See also army, newspapers of the Mahar movement, balutedar, Bombay Legislative 51, 71, 74, 79, 91, 117-21, 125, Council, conversion, conferences, 127, 159, 196, 291 ed-cation, newspapers, religious Nikalji, R.S., 162 practices, satyagraha at Mahad, Non Brahman Movement, 5, 12, 13, temple entry, village role, 16, 42-4, 82, 91-2, 97, 101, watandar, passim.

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vi

Non Brahman (con't), 108, 109, 111, Republican Party of India, 1, 9, 132, 134-5, 145-6, 176n, 194; in 245, 278-86, 293-6 South, 82, 144, 145, 152 Rcham, P.J., 251 Round Table Conferences, 72, 113, Paranjpye, R.P., 123, 129, 153, 116, 125, 126, 173, 174-82, 157, 160-1 189, 132, 197 Parsis, 13n, 90, 93, 123, 127 Parulekar, G.V., 254 Sahastrabuddhe, G.N., 104, 124, Patil, Bhaurao, 43-4, 87n, 135 130, 13In, 132 Patitpawan Baba, 206 Samarth, M.B., 131n Peoples Education Society. 1, 131n, Sangarakshita, Stavira, 232n Sanjivaya, N., 293 239, 288-9 Peshwa, 14, 15, 52, 53, 55, 56 sanskritization, 8, 94 Phule, Jotiba, 5, 32, 42-3, 57, 78, Sapru, Tej Bahadur, 157, 186, 261 132, 135, 230 Sathe, Annabhau, 290 Poona Pact, 182-91 satyagraha, 281-3: at Vaikam, 98Pradhan, D.V., 131n 100, 209, at Mahad, 102-3, 115, Prasad, Rajendra, 186, 299 126, 160, 256-7, for separate Prarthana Samaj, 42, 44-6, 74 electorates, 266-7. See also temple entry. Rajagopalachari, C., 186, 224 Satyashodak Samaj, 43 Rajah, K.C., 157, 158, 170, 174, Savarkar, V.D. (Veer), 75n, 102 183-4, 186, 188, 189, 190n, 207, Scheduled Castes Federation, All224, 261 India, 245, 257-62, 265-7, 271Rajbhoj, P.N., llOn, 112, 133n, 274, 278, 280 Scheduled Tribes, 271, 279-80 164, 185, 186-7, 188, 206, 232, 252, 271 Setalvaa, C.H., 123, 129, 186 Shende, N.R., 74n, 76, 290 Ram Jagjivan, 207, 208, 216, 267, Shinde, Vithal Ramji, 44-5, 46, 273n, 298 57-8, 75, 118n, 135, 145, 147-8, Rama Charana, 168n, 174 153, 158, 163, 230 Ramananda Panth, 28 Ranade, Mahadev Govind, 45, 66, 67, Shivraj, N. (or Shiva Raj), 175, 258 263n, 277 reform (social), 4, 6, 15, 16, 42- Shivaji, 14, 15, 53, 112, 286n Shivtarkar, S.N., 103, 123, 133-4, 46, 49, 61, 66, 74, 85, 248 reforms (political), 5, 8, 81, 182, 251 Sikhs, 178, 180, 215, 227; conver­ 137-195; Minto Morley, 138-9, sion to Sikhism, 210, 213, 217. 140-2, Montagu-Chelmsford, 139, 219-20, 220-26 143-7, 152, Southborough Com­ Socialist Party, 272, 273, 274 mittee, 81-3, 147-58, 167, 168, Solanki, P.G., 162, 163, 164, 188, Muddiman Committee, 138, 155-8, 207 Simon Commission, 139, 163, 175, 167-172, 197, Franchise Committee Srikant, Laxmidar, 163 Srinivasan, Rettamalle, 168n, 174, of 1932, 98n, 139, 182, 183-4, 176n, 177, 188, 193n, 198n, 207 198, Government of India Act of Starte Committee, S8n, 139, 163-7, 1935, 139, 243. See also Round 259-60 Table Conferences, religious practices of Mahars, 22, 26-29, 77, 116. See also Bhakti, temple entry, 71, 73, 78, 79, 107117, 120, 126-7, 189-90, 200-1, Cokhamela, temple entry.

i

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temple entry (con't), 210, 227, 248, 254; at Amraoti, 108-9, at Parvati in Poona,,109-12, 113, 121, 185, at Kalaram in Nasik, 113-17, 175, 200, 202, 205-6, 211, 252 Thakkar, A.V., 163, 186, 190n Thaware, G.M., 183-5, 189n, 273-4 Tilak, B.G. (Lokmanya), 130, 147-8, 193, 194, 197-8, 211, 277 Tilak, Shridhar Balwant, 130 Tipnis, Surendranath G., 100-1, 102, 131n, 250 Upasham, S.A., 164 Varale, B.H., 164 Venkatrao, B.S., 211 village role of Mahar, 3-4, 15, 1624, 30-33, 39, 40, 50, 64, 78 Walangkar, Gopal Baba, 2-3, 5, 27n, 52, 57-9, 85, 94, 119, 151 watan, 19-20, 32, 33, 124, 159, 247, 249, 254, 256, 281 Yag^vkar, Gopal Swami, 27n

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TABLE OF CONTENTS x - xlv

Bibliography

xlvi - xlvii

Glossary

xlviii - xlix

A Note on Nomenclature

1

A Note on Transliteration

li - liii

Preface and Acknowledgements

1 - 1C

Introduction

11 - 80

Chapter I - The Mahar Background 16 26 30 42 49 51 60 69

The Traditional Mahar Role The Religious Role 19th Century Change The Effect of Social Reform The Legitimization of Ambition The Mahar Army Tradition Cokhamela Fre-Ambedkar Leadership

-

26 30 41 49 51 60 69 80

Chapter II - Dr. Ambedkar and the Mahar Movement, 1917-1935 Ambedkar: Background for Leadership Ambedkar's Methods: Conferences Temple Entry Newspapers Depressed ClassesInstitute The Mahars and Other Castes

83 - 94 94 107 117 121 132

- 107 - 117 - 121 - 132 - 136 137 - 195

Chapter III - The Mahars In Politics, 1917-1935 Early Reaction to the Reforms The Southborough Committee Mahars in the Legislature The Simon Commission The Round Table Conferences The Poona Pact "Harijan" vs. "Scheduled Caste"

81 - 136

140 148 158 167 174 182 191

-

148 158 167 174 182 191 195

viii

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ix

Chapter IV - The Leiigious Conversion Movement, 1935-1956 The Announcement of Conversion Sikhism, Islam or Christianity? The Delay in Conversion Conversion to Buddhism

202 214 226 234

- 214 - 226 - 234 - 241

Chapter V - Political Development, 1935-1956 The Independent Labour Party The Scheduled Castes Federation The Republican Party

196 - 241

242 - 286

245 - 257 257 - 278 278 - 286 287 ■ 301

Conclusion MAPS Map I

The Maharashtra Area

302

Map II Scheduled Caste and Buddhist Percentage of Population by District in Maharashtra; Percentage of Mahars returned as Buddhists, 1961 Census of India

303

Map III 1961

304

Buddhist Population of India by State, 1951 and

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F. A. Praeger, 1951.

Asia Publishing House, 19^5 •

Furer-Haimendcrf, C. von: Caste and Politics in South Asia. Politics and Society in India. Edited by C. H. Fnilips. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1963. Gajendragadkar, P. B.: Speech at the Unveiling of the Statue of Dr. B. R_. Ambedkar. Poona: Poona Municipal Corporation, i960. Tpamphletj Galanter, Marc: The Religious Aspects of Caste: A Legal View, South Asian Religion and Politics. Edited by Donald E. Smith. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966. Gandhi, Mohandas K.: All Are Equal in the Eyes of God. Selections from Mahatma Gandhi. Delhi: Publications Division, Government of India, 196^1! _______ . Caste Must Go [and] The Sin of Untouchability♦ Compiled by R. K. Prabhu. Ahmedabad: Navajivan, 196^ . My Varnaahrama Pharma. Edited by Anand T. Hingorani. Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhsvan, 1965. . The Nation's Voice. (Being a collection of Gandhiji18 speeches in England and Sjt. Mahadev Desai's account of the sojourn, September to December, 1931.) 2nd ed. Edited by C. Rajagopalachar and J. C. Kumarappa. Ahmedabad: Navajivan, 19^7. . None High: None Low. Edited by Anand T. Hingorani. Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1965. _______ . The Removal of Untouchability. Compiled and edited by Bharatan Kumarappa. Ahmedabad: Navajivan, 195^. Gazetteer of India Baroda State Gazetteer of the Baroda State. Vol. I - General Information. Compiled by Rao Bahadur Govindbhai, H. Desai and A. B. Clarke. Bombay, 1923.

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Bombay Presidency Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency. Vol. XV - Kanara. Part I. Compiled by James M. Campbell. Bombay, 1883. _______ . Vol. XVIII - Poona. Parts I, II & III. James M. Campbell. Bombay, 1885.

Compiled by

_______ . Vol. XIX - Satara. Compiled by James M. Campbell. Bombay, 1885. ______ . Vol. XX - Sholapur. Compiled by James M. Campbell. Bombay, 188U. _______ . Vol. XXI - Belgaum. Compiled by James M. Campbell. Bombay, 1881+. _______ . Vol. XII - Khandesh. Compiled by James M. Campbell, William Ramsay, and James Pollen. Bombay, 1880. _______ . Vol. XXIII - Bi.japur. Bombay, l88U.

Compiled by James M. Campbell.

_______ . Vol. XXIV - Kolhapur. Compiled by James M. Campbell. Bombay, 1886. Central Provinces and Berar Gazetteer of the Central Provinces of India. 2nd ed. by Charles Grant. Nagpur, lS7C.

Compiled

Gazetteer for the Haidarabad Assigned Districts, Commonly Called Berar. Compiled by A. C. Lyall. Bombay, 1870. Central Provinces District Gazetteer. Buldhasa. Vol. A Descriptive. Compiled by A. E. Nelson. Calcutta, 1910. _______ . Chanda. Vol. A - Descriptive. Compiled by L. F. Begbie and A. E. Nelson. Allahabad, 1909. Central Provinces and Berar District Gazetteer. Akola. Vol. A Descriptive. Compiled by C. Brown and A. E. Nelson. Calcutta, 1910. _______ . Amraoti. Compiled by S. V. Fitzgerald and A. E. Nelson. Bombay, 1911. Ghurye, G. S.: After a Century and a Quarter - Lonikand Then and Now. Bombay: Popular Book Depot, 19^0. _______ . Caste and Class in India. Bombay: 1950.

Popular Book Depot,

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xv i i

Ghurye, G. S.: Caste, Class and Occupation. Bombay: Depot, 1961.

Popular Book

C-okhale, Gopal Krishna: Elevation of the Depressed Classes (Speech given April 27, 1903, at Dharwar Social Conference), Speeches and Writings of Gopal Krishna Gokhale. Vol. III. Edited by D. G. Karve and D. V. Ambekar. Poona: Servants of India Society, and Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1967. _______ . Treatment of Indians by the Boers and Treatment of the Lov Castes in India by Their Own Countryman. London: Christian Literature Society. 1903. Gooddine, R. N.: Report on the Village Communities of the Deccan. (Selections from Records of Bombay Government No. IVK Bombay: Education Society’s Press, 1852. Gopalan, A. K.: Kerala Past and Present. London: Wisehart, 1959.

Lawrence and

Gune, Vithal Trimbak. Judicial System of the Marathas. Poona: Deccan College Post Graduate and Research Institute, 1953. Harrison, Selig S.: India, the Most Dangerous Decades. Princeton: Princeton University Press, i960.” Hart, Frank:

Rabator of Bombay. London:

Epworth Press, 1936.

Hazari: An Indian Outcaste: The Autobiography of an Untouchable. London: Bannisdale, 1951. Heimsath, Charles H.: Indian Nationalism and Hindu Social Reform. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 196k. Heinrich, J. C.: The Psychology of a Suppressed People. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1937Indian National Congress: Report of the Work Done by the AntiUntouchability Sub-Committee, April-December, 1939. Jsmnalal Bajaj , Secretary^ [pamphlet"] Isaacs, Harold R.: India1s Ex-Untouchables. New York: Company, 196V.

John Day

Jatava, Daya Ram: Political Philosophy of B. R. Ambedkar. Agra: Phoenix Publishing Agency. 19o5• _______ . Social Philosophy of B. R, Ambedkar. Agra: Publishing Agency, 19^5".

Phoenix

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Jayakar, M. R.: Story of My Life. House, 1 9 5 ^ 9 . — ---

2 vols.

Bombay:

Asia Publishing

/

Joshi, Laxman Shastri: Jyotirao Fule, 1827-1890, Rationalists of Maharashtra. Calcutta: Indian Renaissance Institute, 1962. Joshi, Ram: Maharashtra, State Politics in India. Edited by Myron Weiner. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968. Karnik, V. B.: Indian Trade Unions: A Survey. Bombay: Education Service, i960.

Labour

Karve, Iravati: Maharashtra - Land and Its People. (Maharashtra State Gazetteer.) Bombay: Directorate of Government Printing, Maharashtra State, 1968. Karve, Iravati, and Damle, Y. B.: Group Relations In Village Community. Poona: Deccan College Mongraph Series: 2l+, 1963. Keer, Dhananjay: Dr. Ambedkar - Life and Mission. Bombay: Prakashan. 1st ed. 195^; 2nd ed. 1962. _______ . Mahatma Jotlrao Phooley. Bombay: . Savarkar and His Times. Bombay:

Popular

Popular Prakashan, 196^. A. V. Keer, 1950.

Keith, A. B.: A Constitutional History of India 1600 - 1935Methuen, 1936.

London:

Kelkar, N. C.: The Elevation of the Depressed Classes, Pleasures and Privileges of the Pen. Poona: Kashinath N. Kelkar, ca. 1929. [Reprinted from Mahratta, 7 November 1909.] Ketkar, Shridhar V.: History of Caste in India, Vol. 1. Taylor, 1909-

Ithaca:

. An Essay on Hinduism. History of Caste in India, Vol. II. London: Luzac and Company, 1911. Khandolkar, Vaman Pandurang (ed.): Indigenous Elementary Education in the Bomba," Presidency in 1855 and thereabouts. Bombay: Indian Institute of Education, 1965. Khare, Leelabai;

In Transit.

Bombay:

Hind Kitabs, 1950.

Khare, N. B.: My Political Memoirs or Autobiography. Nagpur: J. R. Joshi, ca. 1959* Kincaid, C. A.: The Anchorite and Other Stories. London: Milford for Oxford University Press, 1922.

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Humphrey

x ix

Kincaid* C. A.: History of the Maratha People. 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, 1931.

London:

_______ . The Tale of the Tulsi Plant_ and Other Stories. Bombay: Times of India Office, 19oS?~ _______ . Ta3.es of the Saints of Pandharpur. Bombay: Milford for Oxford University Press, 1919.

Humphrey

Kogekar, S. V., and Park, Richard L. (eds.): Report on the Indian General Elections, 1951 - 1952. Bombay: Popular Book Depot,

1955. Kumar, Ravinder: The New Brahmans of Maharashtra [and] The Rise of the Rich Peasants in Western India, Soundings in Modern South Asian History. Edited by D. A. Low. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1968. . Western India in the Nineteenth Century. London: Routledge and Kegal Paul, and Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1968. Latthe, A. B.: Memoirs of His Highness Shri Shahu Chhatrapati Maharaja of Kolhapur. 2 vols. Bombay: Times Press, 192U. Lele, P. R. (ed.): War and Indian Freedom. Bombay: Depot, 19^*0. Lohia, Rammanohar:

The Caste System. Hyderabad:

Popular Book

Navahind, I96U.

Lokanatha (Salvatore): Buddhism Will Make You FreeI!! Panadura, Ceylon: Harijan Publishing Society, 1935! [pamphlet] Lynch, Owen M.: The Politics of Untouchability: A Case from Agra, India, Structure and Change in Indian Society. Edited by Milton Singer and Bernard S. Cohn. Chicago: Aldine, 1968. . Rural Cities in India: Continuities and Discontinuities, India and Ceylon: Unity and Diversity. Edited by Philip Maeon. London: Oxford University Press, 1967• McGavran, D . A .: 1939.

India's Oppressed Classes and Religion. Jubbulpore,

Macnicol, Nicol: Psalms of the Maratha Saints. Calcutta: Press and Oxford University Press, 1919. Machwe, Prabhakar:

Keshaysut. New Delhi:

Association

Sahitya Akademi, 1966.

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XX

Madgulkar, Vyankatesh: The Village Had No Walls. Translated by Ram Deshmukh. Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1958. Mahadevan, S.: Mahatma Gandhi's Warning [and] Flashes in Harijan Tour. Madras: Journalist Publishing House, 193&. Mahipati: Bhaktavijaya: Stories of the Indian Saints. Vol. I. Translated by Justin E. Abbott and Nahar R. Godbole. Poona: N. R. Godbole, 1933. Maine, Henry Sumner: Village-Communities in the East and West. Uth ed. London: J. Murray, 1881. Malkani, N. R.: Clean People and an Unclean Country. Delhi: Sevak Sangh, 1955.

Harijan

Mann, Harold' H.: Housing of the Untouchable Classes in an Indian City (Poona), The Social Framework of Agriculture. Edited by Daniel Thomer. Bombay: Vora and Company, 19^7. [Reprinted from Social Service Quarterly, 1:3 (1916.)] _______ . Land and Labour in a Deccan Village. In collaboration with D. L. Sahastrabuddhe, N. V. Kanitkar, and V. A. Tamhane. Bombay: Oxford University Press, 1917* ____ The 'Mahars* of a Deccan Village (Saswad), The Social Framework of Agriculture. Edited by Daniel Thomer. Bombay: Vora and Company, 1967. [Reprinted from Social Service Quarterly, 11:1 (1916.)] _______ . Statistical Atlas, Bombay Presidency. 3rd ed. Government Central Press, 1925•

Bombay:

. The Untouchable Classes of an Indian City (Poona), The Social Framework of Agriculture. Edited by Daniel Thorner. Bombay: Vora and Company, 1967. [Reprinted from Sociological Review, V (January 1912): 1+2-55.] Mann, Harold H., and Kanitkar, N. V.: Land and Labour in a Deccan Village. Study No. 2. Bombay: Oxford University Press, 1921. " Manwaring, A.:

Marathi Proverbs.

Oxford:

Clarendon Press, 1899*

Matthew, Anjilvel V.: Ehaurao Pat11. Foreword by D. R. Gadgil. Satara: Rayat Shikshan Sa&3tha, 1957• Mayhew, Arthur. 1926.

The Education of India. London:

Faber and Gwyer,

Mehta, Ashok: The Political Mind of India. Bombay: for the Socialist Party, 1952.

Madhu Limaye

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xxi

Mehta, Ashok, and Patvardhan, Achyut: Allahabad: Xitabistan, 19^2.

The Communal Triangle in India.

Mehta, S. D.: The Cotton Mills of India 185H - 195^_. Bombay: Textile Association, 195^T Modak, D. S.: The Bombay Land System and Village Administration. Poona: D. S. Modak, ca. 1932. Modak, B. V.: History of Native Churches, Memorial Papers of the American Marathi Mission 1813 - l8Sl. Bombay: American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions at the Education Society' Press, 1882. Molesvorth, J. T.: A Dictionary, Murathae y d English. Bombay: Bombay Education Society's Press, 1831. Montagu, Edwin S.: An Indian Diary. Edited by Venetia Montagu. London: William Heinemann, 1930. Morris, Morris David: The Emergence of an Industrial Labor Force in India: A Study of the Bombay Cotton Mills,~l8|?^ - 19^7■ Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965* Morris-Jones, W. H.: Stability and Change in Indian Politics, Politics in Southern Asia. Edited by Saul Rose. London: Macmillan, 1963. Nanavati, Manilal B., and Vakil, C. N. (eds.): Group Prejudices in India - A Symposium. Bombay: Vora and Company, 1951. Narasu, P. Lakshmi: The Essence of Buddhism. 3rd ed. Preface by B. R. Ambedkar. Bombay: Thacker and Company, 19^8. _______ . A Study of Caste. Madras:

K. V. Raghavulu, 1922.

Natarajan, S.: A Century of Social Reform in India. 2nd ed. Asia Publishing House, 1962. Nehru, Rameshvari: The HariJ an Movement. Delhi: 19^0. [pamphlet] _______ . Gandhi Is My Star. Patna:

Bombay:

Hari.Ian Sevak Sangh

Pustakbhandar, ca. 1950.

Nichols, Beverly: Verdict on India. New York: Company, 19^ •

Harcourt Brace and

Nurullah, Syed, and Naik, J. P.: History of Education in India. Bombay: Macmillan, 1951.

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x x ii

O'Malley, L. S. S.: Indian Caste Customs. Cambridge: Press, 1932.

University

Orenetein, Henry: C-aon: Conflict and Cohesion in an Indian Village. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965. Ouverkerk, Louise: The Untouchables of India. London: University Press, 19^5.

Oxford

Overstreet, Gene D., and Windmiller, Marshall: Communism in India. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1959Pandian, T . B.: Slaves of the Soil in Southern India and Pandian and the Pariah. Amsterdam: author?, 1899. Pandya, B. V.: Striving for Economic Equality. Bombay: Book Depot, 1959.

Popular

Panikkar, K. M.: The Foundations of Hew India. London: Unwin, 1963.

Allen and

Paranjpye, R. P.: Eighty-Four Not Out. Delhi: Government of India, 19^1.

National Book Trust,

Park, Richard L., and Tinker, Irene (eds.): Leadership and Political Institutions in India. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959. Patel, Govindlal D.: Agrarian Reforms in Bombay. Bombay: Govindlal D. Patel, 1950. Phatak, N. R.: Gcpalrao Deshmukh, "Lokahitavadi," 1823 - 1892, Rationalists of Maharashtra. Calcutta: Indian Renaissance Institute, 19o2. Phillips. Godfrey: The Untouchables1 Quest - The Depressed Classes of India and Christianity. Foreword by B. R. Ambedkar. London: Edinburgh House Press, 1936. Pickett, J. Waskom: Christian Mass Movements in India. New York: Cincinnati, Chicago: Abingdon, 1933. Poplai, S. L. (ed.): 1962 General Elections in India. New Delhi: Allied Publishers Private Limited, 19^2’Pradhan, G. P.: Gopal Ganesh Agarkar, 1856 - 1895, Rationalists of Maharashtra. Calcutta: Indian Renaissance Institute, 1962. Pradhan, G. P., and Bhagwat, A. K.: Lokamanya Tilak, A Biography. Bombay: Jaico Publishing House, 1959.

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Pradhan, G. R.: Untouchable Workers of Bombay City. Foreword by B. R. Ambedkar. Bombay: Karnatak Publishing House, 1938. Prakash, Indra: A Review of the History and Work of the Hindu Mahasabha and the Hindu Sanghatan Movement. Hew Delhi: Mahasabha, 1952. Pyarelal [Nair]: The EpicFast. Ahmedabad: Bhatt, 1932.

Mohanlal Maganlal

_______ . Mahatma Gandhi, The Last Phase. Vol. II. Navajivan, 1950. Pylee, M. V.: 1962.

India’s Constitution. Bombay:

Rajagopalachari, C.:

Ahmedabad:

Asia Publishing House,

Ambedkar Refuted. Bombay:

Rajah, M. C.: The Oppressed Hindus. Madras:

Hindu

Hind Kitabs, 19^+6.

The Huxley Press, 1925.

Ram, Pars: A Unesco Study of Social Tension in Aligarh, 1950 - 1951. Ahmedabad: Hew Order Book Company, 1955. Ranade, M. G.: Rise of the Maratha Power and Other Essays. Introduction by R. V. Oturkar. Bombay: University of Bombay, i960. [Also published in Delhi: The Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 1961. First published 1900.] Ranade, R. D.: Pathway to God in Marathi Literature. Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, I96I. Report of the Land Revenue Settlement of the Bhandara District in the Central Provinces (effected during the years l89*+ - I899T. A. B. Napier, Settlement Officer. Nagpur, 1902. Report on the Land Revenue Settlement of the Nagpur District in the Central Provinces (effected during the years 1&90 - 1595 R. H. Craddock, Settlement Officer. Nagpur, 1899. Return Showing the Results of Elections in India. New Delhi: Government of India, 1937Robbin, Jeanette: Dr. Ambedkar and His Movement. Hyderabad: Ambedkar Publishing Society, 1 9 ^ . Robertson, Alexander: The Mahar Folk. Calcutta: House and Oxford University Press, 1938.

Dr.

Y.M.C.A. Publishing

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x x x iv

Rudolph, Lloyd I., and Rudolph, Susanne Hoeber: The Modernity of Tradition: Political. Development in India. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967. Russell, Robert Vane: The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India. ^ vols. London: Macmillan. 1916. Sadasiva Iyer, T.: Problems of the Depressed Classes. Adyar: M. Subrahmanya Iyer, 1923. Sanjana, J. E.: Caste and Outcaste. Bombay: 19^6 .

Thacker and Company,

Santhanam, K.: The Fight Against Untouchability. New Delhi: Hindustan Times, 19^9.

The

Sardesai, Govind Sakharam: The Main Currents of Maratha History. Patna: Patna University, I92F! _______ . New History of the Marathas. 3 vols. Bombay: Phoenix Publications, 19^6-19^8. Sarkar, Jadunath: 1920.

Shivaji and His Times.

Calcutta:

'Sastri, Sivanath: History of Brahmo Samaj. 2 vols. Chatterji, 1911-1912.

M. C. Sarkar, Calcutta:

SayaJ i Rac III: Speeches ana Addresses of His Highness Sayaj i Rao III, Maharaja of Baroda. London: Macmillan, 1928. Seminar on Casteism and Removal of Untouchability, Report. (Delhi: September 26 — October 2, 1955•) Bombay: Indian Conference of Social Work, 1955. Sen, Surendranath: Administrative System of the.Marathas. Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1923. Setalvad, Chimanlal K.: Recollections and Reflections. Bombay: Padma Publications, ca. 19W. Sharma, Nalin Vilochan: A Biography [of Jagjivan Ram], The Working Man. Edited by Vishwanath Venna and Gyaneshwar Prasad. Patna: Jagjivan Ram Abhinandan Granth Committee, ca. 1957* Sharma, Ram Sharan: Sudras in Ancient India. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1958. Sheean, Vincent: i960.

Nehru:

The Years of Power. New York:

Random House,

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XXV

Shinde, V. R .: The Theistic Directory. Bombay: V. R. Shinde, Depressed Class Mission, 1912. Shrivastayya, V . S.: Elements Amongst the Marathas. Poona: D. K . Shrivastayya for Aitihasik Gaurav Grantha Mala, 1952. Singh, Mohinder: The Depressed Classes - Their Economic and Social Condition. Introduction by Radhakamal Mukerjee. Bombay: Hind Kitabs, 19U7. Sirsikar, V. M.: Political Behaviour in India - A Case Study of the 1962 General Elections. Bombay:M&naktalas, 1965. Sitaraaayya, Pattabhi: The History of the Indian National Congress. Vol. I (1885 - 1935). Bombay: Padna Publications, 1946. Smith, Donald Eugene: India as a Secular State. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963. Smith, William Roy: Nationalism and Reform in India. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1938. Sorensen, R. L.: My Impressions of India. London: ca. 19Vf •

Meridian Books,

Sovani, N. V.: British Impact on India, The New Asia. Edited by Guy S. Metraux and Francois Crouzet. New York: New American Library, 1965. Speer, Robert E. : George Bowen of Bombay. New York: printed, 1938. Srinivas, N. M.: Caste in Modern India. Bombay: House, 1962.

Privately

Asia Publishing

. Religion and Society Among the Coorgs of South India. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952. . Social Change in Modern India. Berkeley: California Press, i960.

University of

Steele, Arthur (compiler): Summary of the Law and Custom of Hindoo Castes Within the Dekkun Provinces Subject to the Presidency of Bombay. Bombay: ordered by Governor in Council, 1827. Stevenson, Mrs. Sinclair (Margaret): Without the Pale, the Life Story of an Outcaste. Calcutta: Association Press and Humphrey Milford for Oxford University Press, 1930. Sundarananda, Swami: Hinduism and Untouchability. Calcutta: Udbodhan Office, 19H6. [Originally published 1922.]

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xxv i

Tendulkar, D. G.: Mahatma. Life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. 8 vols. Bombay: Vithalbhai K. Jhaveri and D. G. Tendulkar, 1952. Thakkar, A. V.: Aboriginals Cry in the Wilderness. Controversy between Dr. Ambedkar and A. V. Thakkar... Bombay: A. V. Thakkar, Servants of India Society, _ca. 19^5. Thaware, G. M.: Gandhiji's Letters Re: Untouchables. Nagpur: L. P. Meshram and H. G. Dongre, ca. 19^8. ~ _______ . Salvation of the Depressed Classes Lies in Joint Electorates. Nagpur: All India Depressed Classes Association, 1932. [pamphlet] Thorat, Major General S.P.P.: The Regimental History of the Mahar MG Regiment. Dehra Dun: The Army Press, 195^• Thought Currents in Maharashtra, 1850 - 1920. Poona: Poona University Teachers' Social Sciences Seminar, 1962. Tinker, Hugh: India and Pakistan - A Political Analysis. New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1962. Tiwari, Chitra: Sudras in Manu. Foreword by Jagjiwan Ram. Motilal Banarsidass, 1963.

Delhi:

Tope, T. K.: Dr. B. R_. Ambedkar, A Symbol of Social Revolt. New Delhi: Maharashtra Information Centre, 196^. [pamphlet] Tugweil, Lt. Col. W.B.P.: History of the Bombay Pioneers. London: Sidney Press, 1938. Tukaram:

The Poems of Tukarama. 3 vols. Translated by J. Nelson Fraswer and K. B. Marathi. London: The Christian Literature Society for India, 1909-1915-

Venkatrangaiya, M.: The General Election in the City of Bombay, 1952. Bombay: Vora and Company, 1953. Watson, Francis (ed.): Talking of Gandhiji. Bombay: .Longmans, 1957 ■ Weiner, Myron: The Politics of Scarcity. Chicago: Chicago Press, 19627

Orient University of

Welfare of Scheduled Castes in Bombay State. Steps to Abolish Untouchability. Banbay: Directorate of Publicity, Government of Bombay, 1956.

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Williams, Francis: A Prime Minister Remembers. The War and Post War Memoirs of the Rt. Hon. Earl Attlee. London: William Heinemann, 1961. Zelliot, Eleanor: Background of the Mahar Buddhist Conversion, Studies on Asia, 1966. Edited by Robert A. Sakai. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1966. _______ . Buddhism and Politics in Maharashtra, South Asian Politics and Religion. Edited by Donald E. Smith. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966. Marathi Atre, PrahlSd Keshav: Marathi Manse, Marathi Mane. Bombay: Parcure Prakashan Mandir, 1957_

. Dalita^ce Baba. Bombay: I960.

G. P.

G. P. Parcure Prakashan Mandir,

Bansod, Kisan Phagu.ji:Pradip. Nagpur: Cokhamelg Abhapg Gatha. Bombay:

Jagriti Prakashan, no date.

Balkrishna Lakshman Pathak, 1950.

Gadgil, N. Vi.: Kahl MotT Kahi MohrSE Poona:

Venus Book Stall, 1962.

Jamgekar, Tulshiram Lakshman: Parvativaril Satyggrah5.cS Powatja. Poona: Anant Vinayak Patwardhan and T. L. Jamgekar, 1930. fpamphlet] Karve, IrSwatT:

Paripurti. ^th ed.

Poona:

Deshmukh and Company, 1959-

Khairmode, Ca. Bh.: DS. BhXmrao Ram.ji Agbeflkar. Vol. 1. Bombay: Y. B. Ambedkar, 1952. Vol. II. Bombay: Bauddhjan Panchayat Samiti, 1959- Vol. III. Bombay: Pratap Prakashan, 196^. Vols. IV and V. Bombay: Dr. Ambedkar Education Society, I966-I968. Kharat, Shajjkarrao: Aspyishyancg Muktisapgram. Poona: Joshi and M. D. Lokhande, no date. . Babasaheb Ambeflkarancya Sahawasaqt. Poona: Prakashan, 1961'. . Bara Balutedar. Poona:

D. Shri

Thokal

Thokal Prakashan, 1959-

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KharSt, Sh&nkarrao : Da. BSbSsSheb Ambedkarance DharmS^tar. Poona: Shri Lekhan Vacan Mandal, 1966. Ketkar, Shrldhar Vyankatesh: Mahar, MahSrashtrlya Dyahkosh, Vol. XVIII. Poona: Maharashtriya Dyankoshmandal Ltd. Nagpur. Kosambi, Dharmanand: Bhagwan Buddha. 2nd ed. Prakashan Mandal, 1957.

Poona:

Suvicar

Navalkar, H. N.: The Life of Shivran Janba Kamble and Brief History of the Poona Parvati Satyagraha. Poona: S. J. Kamble, 1930. iText in Marathi. Title and documents in English.] Pithak, Y. K.: Sapt Katha. Poona: Maharashtra Pradeshik Lokshikshan Samiti, no date, [pamphlet] Ranpise, A. Sh. (Appa): DalitgLhci Vpittapatre. 3ambay: Bhausaheb Adsul for Maharashtra Bauddh Sahitya Parishad, 1962. Shende, Na. Ra.: G_. ~K. Gawai: Vyakti Upl Kgrya. Amraoti: Prabhakar Pandurang Bnatkar, 19^3. Shinde, Viththal RamjT: Andre, 1958.

MajhyS Athvapi va Anubhav.

Poona:

R. B.

Articles, Periodicals and Serial Publications

English A.P.I. (Associated Press of India) News Release, April 27, 19^8. All-India Reporter 1938. Narhari Damodar Vaidya v. Bhimrao Rsmji Ambedkar. Bombay lU6. Andhra Republican (Hyderabad), 196^-1965. Asad, Mohamed: The Jingo Mahatma, Living Age, 3W+ (August.1933): U89-U95. Berreman, Gerald D.: Caste in India and the United States. American Journal of Sociology, LXVI:2 (September i960): 120-127.

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Bhole, R. R.: The Untouchables on the Move, Asiatic Reviev, XL:1^2 (April 19^): 1U6-150. [Discussion, 150-1577] Bombay 1921 - 1922 : A Reviev of the Administration of the Presidency. Bombay: Government Central Press, 1923. Briggs, G. W. : The Harijan and Hinduism, Reviev of Religion, 11:1 (November 1937): 33-59. Clark, Blake: The Victory of an Untouchable, Readers Digest, LVI:335 (March 1950): 107-111. [Reprinted from Christian Herald, March, 1950.] Coatman, John: Reforms in India and the Depressed Classes, Asiatic Reviev, XXIX:97 (January 1933): 1+1-53. [Discussion, 51+-70.] Columbia Alumni Neva (Columbia University, Nev York), December 19, 1930. Depressed Class Mission Worker: The Depressed Classes in Bombay, Social Service Quarterly, 11:1 (July 1916): 35-^1. Depressed Classes Avakenings (Lucknov), June 2 k , 1936. Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Col^sge of Arts, Science and Commerce Magazine (Mahad, Maharashtra). D 1Sousa, Victor S.: Changing Status of Scheduled Castes, Economic Weekly, XIV:t8 (December 1- 1962): 1853-1851+. Pushkin, Lelah: The Backward Classes: Special Policy Treatment, Economic Weekly, XIII:l+3-l+6 (October 28, November 1+ and 18), 1665-1 6 6 8 1695-1705, 1729-1738. . Scheduled Caste Policy in India: History, Problems, Prospects, Aslan Survey, VII:9 (September 1967): 626-636. Edvardes, S. H.: Sidelights on Deccan Village Life - 18th Century, Indian Antiquary, LV (June 1926): 108-113. Foot, Isaac: The Round Table Conference, the Future and the Depressed Classes, Contemporary Reviev, 139 (March 1931): 282-290. Galanter, Marc: Equality and ’’Protective Discrimination" in India, Rutgers Lav Reviev, XVI:1 (1961): k2-fk.

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XXX

Galanter, Marc: Law and Caste in Modern India, Asian Survey, 111:11 (November 1963): 5^-559. _______ . Protective Discrimination for Backward Classes in India, Journal of the Indian Law Institute, 111:1 (January-March 196i ): 39-S9T Ghurye, G. S.: Social Change in Maharashtra, Parts 1 and 2, Sociological Bulletin 1:1 (1952): 71-66, and 111:1 (1953): 1+2-60, C-.S.G. [Gupte, G. S.]: Legislation for the Improvement of the Lot of "Depressed Classes" or "Harijans," Social Reform Annual, 1939: 86-90 .

Harl.jan (Poona or Madras, 1933-191+1; Ahmedabad, 19*+2— ). Hartman, L. 0.: India's Lincoln, Madyam Marg (Lucknow), September 29, 1957. [Reprinted from Zion Herald, March 11, 1936.] Hayter, 0. C. G.: Conversions of Outcastes, Asiatic Review, XXVI:87 (July 1930): 603-611. Hindu Weekly Review (Madras), 1967 - 1968. Indian Annual Register (Calcutta), 1923-1929. Indian Quarterly Register (Calcutta), 1930 - I9U6. Igdu PrakSsh (Bombay), May 5, 1890.

[English Columns.]

Jai tneem (Madras), December 25, 19*+6. James, F. E.: Outcaste Progress in South India, Asiatic Review, XXVI:88 (October 1930): 7l6-72l+. Kadam, V. B.. Notable Dates in the Life of Dr. Ambedkar, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar College of Arts, Science and Commerce Magazine, March 1962. Karve, I. On the Road: A Maharashtrian Pilgrimage, Journal of Asian Studies, XXII:1 (November 1962): 13-29. Karve, Irawati, and Acharya, Hemalata, Neo-Buddhism, Journal of the University of Poona, Humanities Section 15 (1962): 130-133.

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xxxl

Kaushik, P. Datt: Gandhiji and Congress vis-a-vis Untouchables, All India Congress Committee (AICC) Economic Reviev, XV:9 TOctober 1, 1963): 27-30. Kothurkar, V. K., and Pendse, V. V.: A Study of Social Prejudice in Three Villages: the Problem of Nav-Buddhas, Journal of the University of Poona, Humanities Section 15 (1962TI 123-129. Kulkarni, A. R. : Dr. Ambedkar and Buddhism, Maha Bodhi, LVIII:10 (October 1950): 338-3^6. Kulkarni, A. R.: Village Life in the Deccan in the Seventeenth Century^Indian Economic and Social History Reviev, IV:1 (March 196?): 38-52. Lajpat Rai, Lala: The Depressed Classes, Indian Reviev, XIV:6 (June 1913): 1+85-^92. Lambert, R. D.: Untouchability as a Social Problem: Theory and Research, Sociological Bulletin, VII:1 (March 1958): 55-61. Lederle, M.: The Untouchables' Claim to Human Dignity, Journal of the University of Poona, Humanities Section 19 (196^T: 67-7*7” Madras Administration, 1937 - 1938. Madras: Superintendent, Government Press, 1939. Maha Bodhi (Calcutta), 1950-1968. Mahar, Pauline M.: Changing Caste Ideology in a North Indian Village, Journal of Social Issues, XIV:b (1958): 51-65. . Changing Religious Practices of an Untouchable Caste, Economic Development and Cultural Change, VIII:3 (April i960): 279-287. The Mail (Madras), August 26, 19^. Mehta, Subhash Chandra: Persistence of the Caste System: Vested Interest in Backvardness, Quest, No. 36 (January-March 1963): 20-27. Milind College of Arts Magazine (Aurangabad, Maharashtra). Miller, Robert J.: Button, Button...Great Tradition, Little Tradition, Whose Tradition?, Anthropological Quarterly, XXXIX:1 (January 1966): 26-1*2. _______ . They Will Not Die Hindus: the Buddhist Conversion of Mshar Ex-Untoucnables, Asian Survey, VII:9 (September 1967): 637-6UU.

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x x x ii

Morrison, William A.: Knowledge of Political Personages Held by the Male Villagers of Badlapur: an Introductory Delineation,, Sociological Bulletin, X:2 (September 196l): 1-26, and XII:1 (March 1963): 1-17. Nagpur Times, 1935-1936, 1956-1957, 1963-1965Niyogi, M. B.: Problem of Nava Buddha in Maharashtra, Social Service Quarterly. XXXXVIII:U (April 1963): 97-105. Patterson, Maureen L. P.: Caste and Political Leadership in Maharashtra, Economic Weekly, VI:39 (September 25, 195*+): 1065-1067. Presler, Henry H.: Neo-Buddhist Stir in India, India Cultures Quarterly, XXI:U (I96U). Raeside, I. M. P.: A Bibliographical Index of Mahanubhava Works in Marathi, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, XXIII: 3 (196071 OT-507. Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, Annual Reports, 1950 — . Report on Native Newspapers in Bombay Presidency, 1881, 1890, 1903» 1920, 1921. Right Review (Ajmer), 1961. Rudolph, Lloyd and Susanne H.: The Political Role of India's Caste Associations, Pacific Affairs, XXXIII:! (March i960): 5-22. Sangharakshita, Stavira: Mass Civil Disobedience in India by ExUntouchable Buddhists, Institute of Race Relations News Letter, March, 1965: 11-13. Shah, Pradeep: Caste and Political Process, Asian Survey, VI:9 (September 1966): 516-522. Shastri, Sankarananda: A Report on the Conversion Movement, Maha Bodhi, LXV:*+ (April 1957): 128-130. Siddharth College of Arts and Sciences Magazine, (Bombay). Siddharth College of. Commerce and Economics Magazine, (Bombay). Siddharth College of Law Magazine, (Bombay).

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x x x iii

Singh, Saint Nihal, India's "Untouchables," Contemporary Reviev, CIII (March 1913): 376-385. Sirsikar, V. M., A Study of Political Workers in Poona, Journal of the University of Poona, Humanities Section 13 (196lH 77-158. Srinivas, M. N., and Beteille, A.: The "Untouchables" of India, Scientific American, CCXIII:6 (December 1965): 13-17* Stern, Robert W.: Maharashtrian Linguistic Provincialism and Indian Nationalism, Pacific Affairs, XXXVII:! (Spring 196 k): 37-^9. Tilak, B. G.: The Emancipation of the Untouchable, Hindu Missionary, XLII (April 15, 1918). The Times (Kandy), May 26, 1950. The Times (London), 1930-1932. Times of India (Bombay), 1930-1968. Windmiller, Marshall: The Politics of States Reorganization in India: the Case of Bombay, Far Eastern Survey, XXV:9 (September 1956): 129-1U3. Young India (Ahmedabad), 1919-1922. Marathi Cokhgrneja (Nagpur), February 27, 1936. Dainik MarStha (Bombay), Juij 13, 1965. Duniya (Bombay), May 2, 1928. Janata (Bombay), 1929 - 1955* Janata Khas Apk (Bombay), 1933. Keluskar, A. C., NirvSr, ShySmsundar (Bombay), August, 1963. Kirloskar (Xirloskarvadi) November, 1935* Maharashtra Taims (Bombay), 1963 - 1968. MarStha (Poona), August 196U.

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xxx iv

Marhapha (Ambedkar School of Politics, Poona), 19^6-191*7. Navayug (Bombay), April 13, 19**7. PrabuddhaBharat (Bombay), 1955 - 1968.

The Writings of B. R. Ambedkar

Books, Pamphlets, Articles English [Presidential] Address to the All India Depressed Classes Conference. Nagpur, 1930. Indian Annual Register, 1930. Vol. II: 36737^. [Presidential] Address to the G.I.P. Railway Depressed Class Workmen's Conference. Manmad: privately printed, 1938. Annihilation of Caste with a Reply to Mahatma Gandhi. 3rd ea. Amritsar: Ambedkar School of Thoughts, 19^5. [1st published 1936.] A Bill to Control and Regulate Money-Lending. Bombay: Labour Party Publications No. 2. , 1938. * * * v

Vvo

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P «m V »o^r • * ^ W » II L / W j •

Vi

P a I

1

Independent

P i i V i l 4 a o +*? A U W ^ A W U ) Uab W A A

T

)

1957. The Buddha and the Future of His Religion, Maha Bodhi, 58 (April-May 1950): 117-118, 199-206. Buddha and Karl Marx. [Speech to Uth Conference of World Fellowship of Buddhists, Katmandu, 1956.] Nagpur: M. D. Panchbhai, 1961*. Another version printed as "Ambedkar on the Danger to Buddhism" in Wesak Lotus Blossom Annual (Penang, Malaya), i960: 17-23. The Cabinet Mission and the Untouchables. Bombay: ca. 19H6. Case for Hindu Code. 1^97”

New Delhi:

Privately printed,

Beacon Information and Publications,

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XXXV

Castes in India - Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development, Indian Antiquary. XLVI (1917): 81-95. Communal Deadlock and a_ way to Solve It. [Address to the session of the All-India Scheduled Castes Federation, May 6, 19^5.] Bombay: privately printed. Evolution of Provincial Finance.

London:

Federation Versus Freedom. Poona: and Economics, 1939.

P. S. King and Son, 1925.

Gokhale Institute of Politics

Grievances of the Scheduled Castes. [Memorandum submitted to His Excellency the Governor-General on the 29th October-, 19^2.] Ilew Delhi: privately printed. Maharashtra as a Linguistic Province. Bombay:

Thacker and Co., 19^+8.

Mr. Gandhi and the Emancipation of the Untouchables. Bombay: and Company, 19^3.

Thacker

Pakistan or The Partition of India. 3rd ed. Bombay: Thacker and Company, 19^6. [lst published as Thoughts on Pakistan, 19^0.] Parliamentary Democracy, Dr. B_. R. Ambedkar on. [Address delivered 22 December 1952 under the auspices of the Poona District Law Library on "Conditions Precedent for the Successful Working -f Democracy."] Poona: V. B. Gogate, Poona District Law Library. Problem of the Rupee— Its Origin and Solution. London: P. S. King and Company, 1923. [Reissued by Thacker and Company, Bombay, 19^7, under the title History of Indian Currency and Banking, Vol. 1.1 Ranade, Gandhi and Jinnah. Bombay: Thacker and Company, 19^3. [Reprinted by Bheem Patrika Publications, Jullundur City, I96U.] The Rise and Fan of the Hindu Woman. (Who Was Responsible For it?) Hyderabad: Dr. Ambedkar Publications Society, cs. 1955. States and Minorities.

Bombay:

C. Murphy for Thacker, 19^7.

Thoughts on Linguistic States. Privately printed, ca. 1955*

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xxxv i

Thoughts on the Reform of Legal Education in the Bombay Presidency, Government Lav College Magazine, 1936: 6-17. Thus Spoke Ambedkar. (Selected Speeches). Compiled by Bhagwan Das. Jullundur City: Bheem Patrika Publications, 1963. The Untouchables. (Who were they and why they became untouchables.) New Delhi: Amrit Book Company, 19^8. What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables. 2nd ed. Bombay: Thacker and Company, 19^6. Who Were the Shudras? (How they came to be the Uth Varna in the Indo-Aryan Society.) Bombay: Thacker and Company, 19^6. Marathi and Hindi BhagwSn Buddha aur Unka Dharm. (Translated by Anand Kausalayayan.) Hindi translation of The Buddha and His Dhamma. Bombay: Siddharth Prakashan, 1961. Mukhti Kon Pathe? Bombay: in Marathi.)

Bharat Bhushan Press, 1936.

(Pamphlet

Unpublished English Buddhism. Talk recorded for the British Broadcasting Company May 1*+, 1956. [Typescript, Administrator General's files, Bombay.] Criteria of Backwardness. [Typescript, Administrator General's files, Bombay, ca. 1955.] Essays on Caste.

[Typescript, Administrator General's files, Bombay.]

Foreword to The Buddha and His Dhamma.

[Typescript.]

Government of India Scheduled Castes Scholarship Scheme. [Typescript, Administrator General's files, Bombay, ca. 19^2.]

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

x x x v ii

Hov a Movement Becomes a Political Party. Siddharth College, ca. 1956.]

[Typescript, S. S. Rege,

A People at Bay. The Tragedy of the Untouchables of India. Outline and Chapters IX - Slaves and Untouchables; XIV - The Condition of the Convert. [Typescript, Mildred Drescher, Grand Rapids, Michigan.] The Philosophy of Hinduism. [Part typescript, part handwritten, Administrator General ’ s files, Bombay.] Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Ancient India. Administrator General's files, Bombay.]

[Typescript.

Riddles in Hinduism - An Exposition to Enlighten the Masses. [Typescript, Administrator General's files, Bombay.] Statement in Explanation of Resignation. [Typescript, Administrator General's files, Bombay, October 10, 1951.] Untouchables and Change of Religion. General's files, Bombay.]

[Typescript, Administrator

Marathi Prantik Bahishkrit Parishad (adhiveshan dusre). [District Conference of the Depressed Classes, second session.] Presidential Address of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, May 10, I92U, Barshi, Solapur District. [Ms. in Marathi in Kh&irmoday Collection, Bombay University Library.] Letters Administrator General's files, Bombay. Khairmoday collection, Bombay University Library. Private collection in the possession of B. K. Gaikvad, Nasik. Private collection in the possession of Nanak Chank Rattu, Delhi. Seligman papers, Columbia University Library.

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

x x x v iii

Public Documents O m M g B M W M 1iliWl"

S B

Where possible, the document is listed under the designation given in Patrick Wilson (compiler and ed.): Government and Politics of India and Pakistan - 1885-1955: a bibliography of works in western languages. Berkeley: South Asia Studies, Institute of Asiatic Studies, University of California, 1956. Abbreviations for Parliamentary Papers: Cmd. Command paper House of Commons paper H.C. House of Lords paper H.L. Parliamentary papers (H.C. sessional papers) Pari. Pap. H.M.S.O. His Majesty's Stationery Office Bombay (Presidency.) Depressed Classes and Aboriginal Tribes Committee. Report. Bombay: Government Central Press, 1930. (O.H.B. Starte, Chairman.) Bombay Legislative Assembly Debates, 1937 - 1939* Bombay

Legislative Council Debates, 1921 - 1937-

East India (constitutional reforms.) Addresses Presented in India to his excellency the Viceroy and the Right Honourable,the Secretary of State for India. London: H.M.S.O., 191&. Cmd. 917&; Pari. Pap. 1918: XVIII. Government of India. Backward Classes Commission. Report. 3 vols. [IVCMWU ••*-t Delhi: Manager of P Chairman.) ( V n V o

Government of India. Ministry of Law. Act, 1955. 22 of 1955.

IT o l o l Vi

The Untouchability (Offences)

Great Britain. India Office. Franchise Committee. East India (constitutional reforms: Lord Southborough's committees.) 3 vols. London: H.M.S.O., 1919. Cmd. lM, 102, 176; Pari. Pap. 1919: XVI. Vol. I: Report of the Franchise Committee. Vol. II: Report of the Division of Functions Committee. Vol. Ill: Views of the Government of India upon the Reports of Lord Southborough1s Committees. (Lord Southborough, Chairman.) [See also The Reforms Committee (Franchise.)] Government of India Bill, 1935* Instruments of Instructions to the Governor General and Governors. London: H.M.S.O., 1935. Cmd. 1*805; Pari. Pap. 193U>35:XVI.

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xxsix Great Britain. Indian Delimitation Committee. Government of India Act 1935- Report of Committees appointed in connection with the Delimitation of Constituencies and Connected Matters. Vol. Ill: Selections from Evidence. London: H.M.S.O.V 193^. Great Britain. Indian Franchise Committee, 1932. Report. 5 vols. London: H.M.S.O., 1932. Vol. I: Report. Cmd. Ho86; Farl. Pap. 1931/32: VIII. Vols. II-III: Memoranda submitted by the Local Governments and the Provincial Franchise Committees. Vols. IV - V: Selections from Memoranda submitted by Individ­ uals and Oral Evidence. (Marquess of Lothian, Chairman.) Great Britain. Indian Statutory Commission. Report. Vol. Ill: Reports of the Committees appointed by the Provincial Legisla­ tive Councils to cooperate with the Indian Statutory Commis­ sion. Vols. XVI-XVII: Selections from Memoranda and Oral Evidence by Non-Officials. London: H.M.S.O., 1930. (Sir John Allsebrook Simon, Chairman.) _______ . Interim Report. Review of the Growth of Education in British India by the Auxiliary Committee of the Indian Statutory Commission. London: H.M.S.O., 1929. Cmd. 3^07; Pari. Pap. 1928/29:X. (P. J. Hartog, Chairman.) Great Britain. Parliament. Joint Committee on Indian Constitutional Reform. Report...together with Proceedings. 6 vols. London: H.M.S.O., 1933-193V. H.L. 79, H.C. 112; Pari. Pap. 1932/33: V—IX. (Marquis of Linlithgow, Chairman.) . Joint Select Committee on the Government of India Bill. Report and Proceedings, b vols. London: H.M.S.O., 1919-1920 H.C. 203-203-Ind; Pari. Pap. 1919: IV. (Earl of Selbourne, Chairman.) India.

Reforms Enquiry Committee, 192b. Report. London: H.M.S.O., 1925. Cmd. 2360; Pari. Pap. 192U/25:X. Appendix 5: Written Evidence; Appendix 6: Oral Evidence. 2 vols. London: H.M. S.O. , 1925. (A. P. Muddiman, Chairman.)

Indian Round Table Conference, 1st. Proceedings. 12th November 1930 19th January 1931.' London: H.M.S.O., 1931. Cmd. 3778; Pari. Pap. 1930/31: XII. (Ramsay MacDonald, Chairman.) Proceedings of Sub-Committees. 1931.

2 vols.

London:

H.M.S.O.,

Indian Round Table Conference, 2nd. Proceedings. 7th September 1931 1st December 1931. London: H.M.S.O.. 1932. Cmd. 3997; Pari. Pap. 1931/32: VIII. (Ramsay MacDonald, Chairman.)

Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

• Proceedings of Federal Structure Committee and Minorities Committee. London: H.M.S.O., 1932. Indian Round Table Conference, 3rd. Proceedings. 17th November 1932 2^th December 1932. London: H.M.S.O., 1933-. Cmd-. ^238; Pari. Pap. 1932/33:XI. (Ramsay MacDonald, Chairman.) The Reforms Committee (Franchise.) Evidence Taken Before the Reforms Committee. 2 vols. Calcutta, 1919- (Lord Southborough, Chairman.)

Documents of the Mahar Movement The following minutes, reports, petitions and leaflets are generally available only in private collections. Those documents in the Khairmoday collection of the Bombay University Library are marked (K). English All India Scheduled Castes Federation. P. N. RajbhoJ, ca. 1951. . Resolutions. Chanda: tion, ca. 1955.

Election Manifesto. New Delhi:

All India Scheduled Castes Federa­

All India Scheduled Castes Students Federation. Session. Nagpur, 19^7.

Report of Second

Appeal on Behalf of the Depressed Classes Institute. London, November, 1931. (K) An Appeal to the Princes and People of India: Funds for a Social Centre for the Untouchables in Bombay. New Delhi, ca. 19^2. Bhandare, R. D.: Presidential Address, Republican Party of India. Given at Parel, Bombay, March 1965. p»Tn«.wA to institute an Enquiry into the Death of Dr. B_. B>. Ambedkar. Scheduled Caste Communities of Konkan Districts. 1 9 5 7 . W Depressed Classes Institute Report for 1925. Bombay: Classes Institute, 1925. “~(k 5

Depressed

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xli

Depressed Classes Institute (Bahishkrlt Hitakarini Sabha) Rules of Constitution. Bombay: Depressed Classes Institute, ca. 19257 (lei Dhamma Deekaha. Buddhist Society of India, New Delhi. Independent Labour Party. Its Formation and Its Aims. Independent Labour Party Publications No. 1. 193^7 (k) Judgments and Buddha Religion. Nagpur: Bharatiya Bauddhaj an Mahasabha, Nagpur City Branch, 1963. The Neo-Buddhist Movement in India. .Bombay: Society of India, 196^7 Report of the Depressed Class Conferences. 19^27

Nalanda Education

Nagpur:

G. T. Meshram,

Republican Party of India. Charter of Demands. Delhi: Dada Sahib B. K. Gaikwad, B. P. Maurya. B. D. Khobragade. I96U. _

. Election Manifesto of 1957• Delhi: 1957.

B. D. Khobragade,

Unpublished Marathi and Hindi Antyaja Samaj, Mopla, 1919.

[Resolutions]

CokhameTS Reform Society, Racrtek, 1923. Loyal Mahar Sabha, Nagpur, 191^. Mahera Sabha Badnuir, Badnur, I92U.

[Resolutions]

[Resolutions] (Hindi.)

[Resolutions]

Petition of Anarya Doshparihar Mapdali [or Anarya Doshpariharak Mandali], Dapoli, July I89U. (K) Pune Jilha Bahishkrit Samajatarphe MSnpatal932. [A welcome address to Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar from the Depressed Classes Society of Poona District.] Republican Party Resolutions, May 1, 1966. Sanmarg Bodhak NirSshrit Samaj, Nagpur, 1903.

[Message]

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x lii

Unpublished Material

Public Archives Bombay Archives. Government File, Education Department, No. 63 I - 1918. Sapru Collection.

National Library, Calcutta.

U. S. Office of Strategic Services, Research and Analysis Branch. The Depressed Classes of India. Washington, 19^3. [Film 102U. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Microfilms.] Manuscripts and Theses Cohen, Stephen P.: The Untouchable Soldier: Caste, Politics and the Indian Army, Journal of Asian Studies [forthcoming.] Pushkin, Lelah: The Policy of the Indian National Congress toward the Depressed Classes - An Historical Study. M.A. Thesis. University of Pennsylvania, 1957Fifty Years of Buddhist Activity in South India. Ms. in the office of the Administrator General, Bombay. [Typescript.] Fiske, Adele M.: The Use of Buddhist Scriptures in Dr. B. R. Ambedkar's The Buddha and His Dhamma. M.A. Thesis. Columbia University, 1966. Galanter, Marc, (compiler and ed.): Legal Materials for the Study of Modern India. Part II: Law and Caste from the Consolida­ tion of the Modem Legal System to Independence, i860 - 19^7• [Mimeographed.] Harnetty, Peter: The American Civil War and the Export of India Cotton. Association for Asian Studies, March, 19^7. [Mimeographed.] Irschick, Eugene: Politics and Social Conflict in South India: Non-Brahmin Movement and Tamil Separatism, 1916 - 1929Ph. D. Thesis. University of Chicago, 196k.

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the

x liii

Karve, Iravati, and Ranadive, J. S.: The Social Dynamics of a Growing Town and Its Surrounding Area. [Typescript.] Khairmoday, C. B.; Ethnographic Note on Mahar.

[Typescript.]

Kulkarni, M. G. : Report on the Survey to Assess the Programme for Removal of Untouchability in Maharashtra State. Part I Buldana District, August 1962. Part II - Nasik District, October 1962. [Typescript.] Lynch, Oven M.: The Politics of Untouchability - Social Structure and Social Change in a City of India. Ph. D. Thesis. Columbia University, 1966. Miller, Beatrice Diamond: Revitalization Movements: Theory and Practice as Evidenced among the Buddhists of Maharashtra, India. Verrier Elwin Memorial Volume [forthcoming.] Nava Dikshit Bauddhanci Samasya [Newly Converted Buddhists' Problems.] Report of a conference held June 3-5, 19^0, at Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Poona. (Mimeographed.) [In English and Marathi] Patterson, Maureen L. P.: A Preliminary Study of the Brahmin versus Non-Brahmin Conflict in Maharashtra. M.A. Thesis. University of Pennsylvania, 1952. Ravenell, Barbara J.: The Scheduled Castes and Panchayati Raj. M.A. Thesis. University of Chicago, 1965* Tucker, Richard Philip: M. G. Ranade and the Moderate Tradition in India: 18L2 - 1901. Ph. D. Thesis. Harvard University, 1966. Zelliot, Eleanor: Cokhamela, a Fourteenth Century Mahar Saint-Poet. Maharashtra Mandali Conference, 1968. [Dittoed.]

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Persons Interviewed in India, November 1963 - April 1965 Satish Adsul, Poona D.C. Ahir, Delhi U.R. Amrao, Poona Mrs. B.R. Ambedkar, Delhi Yeshwant B. Ambedkar, Bombay D.M. Arolkar, Bombay P.K. Atre, Bombay H.D. Awode, Nagpur L.R. Bailey, Jullundur City (interviewed in Delhi) N.G. Bhagat, Kampti S.S. Bhalerao, Dhond R.D. Bhandare, Bombay K.D. Bhingardive, Ahmadnagar R.R. Bhole, Poona M .B. Bhonde, Poona P.T. Borale, Bombay S.D. Singh Chaurasia, Delhi M.B. Chitnis, Aurangabad Datta Copade, Dehu Road S.V. Dahat, Nagpur Bhagwan Das, New Delhi B.M. Deshbhratar, New Delhi C.D. Deshmukh, New Delhi A.N. Deshpande, Nagpur Dadasaheb Dharmadikar, Nagpur Balwant Savalaram Dhotre, Bombay Arun Donde, Bombay Damayanti Dongre, Nagpur Kanj i Dwarkadas, Bombay Mrs. L. Eshwari Bai, Hyderabad S.J. Fulgele, Nagpur D.R. Gadgil, Poona D.K. Gaikwad, Poona R.R. Gaikwad, Poona B.K. (Dadasaheb) Gaikwad, Nasik S.D. Gaikwad, Bombay Kausraj Gajbhiye, Nagpur B.P. Gajendragadkar, New Delhi S.S. Gangaole, Bhusaval G.A. (Nanasaheb) Gawai, Amraoti R.S. Gawai, Amraoti S.R. Godbole, Nagpur W.M. Godbole, Nagpur

V.B. Gogate, Poona N.G. Goray, Poona M.S. Gotarne, Poona S.M. Hasan, Hyderabad B.M. Hiwale, Bhusawal D.G. Jadhav, New Delhi and Bombay M.S. Jagtap, Poona B.M. Jedhe, Poona P.P. Joshi, Mahad Lakshman Shastri Joshi, Wai S.C. Joshi, Bombay K.N. Kadam, Ratnagiri (interviewed in Poona, Dapoli and Ambadave) N.K. Kadam, Poona V.B. Kadam, Bombay Bhaskarrao Kadrekar, Bombay B.C. Kamble, Bombay B.D. Kamble, Poona B.G. Kamble, Poona C.J. Kamble, Dhayri (interviewed in Poona) J.G. Kamble, Wadace Masave V.B. Karnik, Bombay D.D. Karve, Poona Irawati Karve, Poona R.M. Kate, Poona Bhadant Anand Kausalyayan, Kelaniya, Ceylon Mr. Kavadi,, Nagpur S.R. Kavade, Bopodi Vittal Govind Kedari, Poona Kemchandra, Agra (interviewed in Ahmadabad) C.B . Khairmoday, Bombay A.D. and Devidas Kharat, Poona Shankarrao Kharat, Poona B.N. Khasbe, Poona B.D. Khobragade, Chanda (interviewed in Ahmadabad and Nagpur) V.B. Kolte, Amraoti J.H. Krishnamurti, Hyderabad A.R. Kulkarni, Nagpur M.G. Kulkarni, Poona N.H. Kumbhare, Kampti

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M. Lederle, S.J., Poona Ram Hanohar Lohia, New Delhi (interviewed in Poona)

B. Sham Sundar, Hyderabad Y.C. Shankaranand Shastri, New Delhi Sohan Lai Shastri, New Delhi G.T. Madkholkar, Nagpur N.R. Shende, Nagpur B.S. Mahadik, Dapoli N.M. Shewalay, Bombay D.R. and Kashi Maheshkar, Poona B.S. Shinde, Poona J.N. Mandal, Calcutta (interviewed L. Shivalingaiah, Bangalore in Bombay) (interviewed in Poona) N. Shivraj, Madras (interviewed in G.B. Mane, Phaltan M.P. Mangudkar, Poona Ahmadabad) B.P. Maurya, New Delhi S.N. Shivtarkar, Bombay D.P. Meshram, Nagpur L.M. Shrikant, Delhi V.W. Moon, Bramhapuri Balwant Singh, Delhi V.K. Moon, Nagpur Amar Dhar Singh, Nagpur V.E. Moray, New Delhi and London D.B. Sonavane, Kirkee P.S. More, Poona K.B. Talwatkar, Bombay Deorao Naik; Bombay B.R. Tayade, Poona N.C. Naydive, N. gpur C.P. Thorat, Bombay Surendranath Tipnis, Mahad B.S. Nimal, Poona N.M. Nimgade, New Delhi N.K. Tirpude, Nagpur M.B. Niyogi, Nagpur T.K. Tope, Bombay T.R. Padale, Poona M.D. Panchbhai, Nagpur Nalini Pandit, Bombay R.N. Patil, Nagpur R.R. Patil, Nagpur D.D. Powar, Hardapsar N.R. Phatak, Bombay Jaidev Prasad, Patna N.G. Pundlik, Poona P.N. Rajbhoj, Poona Jagjivan Ram, New Delhi S.N. Ramteke, Mahad A.S. Ranpise, Bombay J.M. Rathod, Ahmedabad Nanak Chand Rattu, New Delhi S.S. Regs, Bombay P.J. Roham, Ahmadnagar S. Roy, New Delhi D.T. Rupawate, Wai

S.A. Upasham, Bombay S.Y. Waghmare, Poona S.S. Wanjari, Nagpur G.V. Wanshiv, Poona Long as this list is. some essential names were lost when my file of names disappeared. To those who aidid me and are not acknowledged here, I offer my apologies.

Raj Salve, Poona M.B. Samarth, Bombay P.C. Samudre, Poona Stavira Sangarakshita, Poona and London D.R. Sardesai, Poona M.L. Sha'hare, Aurangabad

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GLOSSARY abhanga - (literally, unbroken or inviolable) a particular metrical composition used by poets of the bhakti school. Babasaheb - (literally, father-master) the affectionate and respectful nickname given to B. R. Ambedkar around 1930 and used widely by his followers and other Maharashtrians. baluta - grain assigned to village servants. A public village servant entitled to baluta is called a baluteaar. Each village traditionally had twelve balutedars. bhakti - devotional religion. In Maharashtra, chiefly the cult of Vithoba centered in Pandhapur. diksha - engaging in the rites of a religious vow. Used in the Mahar movement to mean conversion from Hinduism to Buddhism. Jati - the endogamous caste unit, i.e. Mahar, Cambhar, Chitpavan Brahman. Within some jatis, small endogamous units, called po^JSts, exist, generally within a specific territory, i.e. Ladvan Mahar, Somawanshi Mahar. lmkh - 100,000 maharwa^a - the living quarters of the Mahar caste in a village. Mahera - variant of Mah&r.. Mhar - variant of Mahar used in British writings. Muhar - variant of Mahar used in British writings. pancait - (usually spelled panchayat in English) - the designated arbiters, usually five in number, of a village or caste dispute. panth - sect or cult. xlvi

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ParvarT - a synonym for Mahar, generally used for Mahars in the army. sangha - group or organisation. bhikkhus or monks.

Also used for the body of Buddhist

sanskritization - a term initiated by M. H. Srinivas (see p. 8n) to indicate the practice of a lower caste following higher caste custom or ritual in an attempt to claim higher status. satyagraha - (literally, truth-grasp) a term initiated by Mohandas IT. Gandhi for non-violent protest demonstrations. Taken up by those in the Mahar movement as a name for attempts to gain temple entry and water rights. Swaraj - self-rule, national independence. varna - the traditional four-fold division of peoples into Brahman (priest,) Kshatriya (ruler and soldier,) Vaishya (merchant) and Shudra (servant of all others.) The system is called ehaturvarna (four varpas) or varnashrama dharma (duties of the stages of varpa.) watan - a hereditary estate or office. One who holds such a hereditary estate or office is called a watandar. The village patil (headman), kulkarqT (accountant) and Mahar (inferior village servant) were traditionally watandSrs. warkari - a man who performs periodical pilgrimages, used for members of the bhakti sect centered around the God Vithoba.

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A NOTE ON NOMENCLATURE

Many terms have been used for India's Untouchables. also been much debate over who is untouchable. used are these:

There has

The criteria generally

one whose touch pollutes, who is debarred from the

inner temple, who may not use the same water supply the general populace uses. clear.

In each village, who is and who is not untouchable is

On all-India terms, there is a problem of designation.

Changes

in classifications also occur as different criteria are applied.

For

instance, the Rajbhanshis of Bengal were not counted as Depressed Classes in 1931, but they are numbered among Scheduled Castes today. The Iravas of Travancore were considered Untouchable in 1931, they are not today.

It should be understood that the word Untouchable does not

designate a single, unified similarly-treated group of people and that caste names for an endogamous group in a specific area are best used. With this understanding, the following synonyms for Untouchable may aid the reader. achttt - untouchable (Hindi) Ad-Dharm - pre-religious, meaning pre-Aryan, used in the North. Adi-Andhra - pre-Andhran, meaning those people living in Andhra before the arrival of the cultivator and Brahman castes, but not including tribal peoples. Adi-Dravida - pre-Dravidian, meaning those people living in Madras before the arrival, of the cultivator and Brahman castes, but not including tribal peoples.

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aijtyaja - last-born; outside the varna categories, asprishya - untouchable (Marathi and Sanskrit). avarpa - without varqa, outside the varna categories. Backward Classes - a governmental term used both for nonUntouchable castes which are economically and educationally backward and as a general term for these castes together with the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes. Depressed Classes - the common popular and governmental term for Untouchables, used widely until the mid-30’s. Exterior Castes - castes outside the varpa categories. HariJan - "People of God." a term originated by Mohandas K. Gandhi as a substitute for the harsh term, Untouchable; used by Gandhi, Congressmen and some Untouchables from 1933 on; now used semi-officially. Oppressed Classes - an early English term for Untouchable. Outcaste - a term popularly and inaccurately used for Untouchable. Panchama - "fifth," meaning those outside the four-fold varna categories. Pariah - a term borrowed from a Tamil Untouchable caste name and generally applied to Untouchables. Scheduled Castes - those castes placed on a government schedule in 1935 to qualify for special political, educational and economic rights as members of castes traditionally deprived of such opportunities. Not to be confused with Scheduled Tribes, a similar listing of groups of aboriginal peoples still living in a tribal organization. Suppressed Classes - a synonym used in English writing for Untouchable.

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A NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION

Marathi words, terms from Sanskrit and Pali, book titles in Marathi and the authors' names used in Marathi references have been given the simplest possible transliteration: = a [the inherent short a, when not pro­ long a 1__ j = 7 j. nounced, is omitted in transliteration) = U long u = sh s and s retroflex letters = d, dh, 1, n, ri, t, th = n, anuswar = v, v or w and usage Inconsistencies occur when custom and usage vary from the diacritical system used. Thus: cambhar is way most Cokhamela, is given

written Chambhar, since it appears that often in English, but a name not yet familiar to English speakers, its correct transliteration.

In general, an individual's preference or common English usage dictates the way names are spelled in the text. However, in bibliographic references, the transliteration system is used. Thus: Ca. Bh. Khairmode is used in bibliographic references; C.B. Khairmoday is used when referring to the individual.

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PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My initial intention to write a political biography of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar was gradually changed during my period of research in India to an attempt to record the factors in Mahar and Maharashtrian nistory which produced Dr. Ambedkar, and to discover the way in which he in turn changed the history of his caste, in other words, to concentrate on the movement rather than the man.

This new perspective demanded

a study not only of the written record, but of much that was not officially recorded and of the life of the still vital movement in which the Mahars, now for the most part Buddhists, are involved.

My

debt to those who shared their current life and their memories with me is great.

I have recorded the names of those essential to my

study in the bibliography, although the length of that list has caused me to omit a number whose kindness was much appreciated. My study as it now appears is the result of contact with the living participants of the history 1 have recorded.

For this reason

I must acknowledge my sources in the same place that I record my intentions.

From the long list of those I interviewed, I should lift

out several names for special comment:

D.R. and Kashi Maheskar,

B.R. Tayade, S.Y. Waghmare, P.C. Samudre, U.R. Amrao and Shantabai Kamble for their assistance in interviews and travel and their sustain­ ed friendship; S.D. Gaikwad in Bombay for his conducted tours of Ambedkarian places and his aid in securing materials; C.B. K'nairmoday

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for sharing not only his collected materials in the Bombay University Library but also his experiences; V.W. Moon, then in Bramhapuri, whose collection of Vidarbha materials added a new dimension to my thesis; Dr. V.E. Moray, who read and commented helpfully on a near-final draft of my thesis in London; Dadasaheb Gaikwad in Nasik who allowed me to read all Dr. Ambedkar's correspondence with him during the vital years of the movement and who won my enduring respect; Dr. Savita Ambedkar and Yeshwant Ambedkar, who graciously gave me permission to use the files of Dr. Ambedkar's papers now in the Administrator General's Office in Bombay; M.N. Panchbhai in Nagpur, who made sure that I saw and heard as much of the life and history of the Mahar and Buddhist movement in Nagpur as was humanly possible.

Needless to say,

ail these men and women are not responsible for my interpretation of the history of the movement which has been at the core of their lives. I must also acknowledge gratefully the cooperation of officials and librarians at the Deccan College Post Graduate and Research Institute and the Gokhale Institute of Economics and Politics in Poona; at the Administrator General's Office, the Government of Bombay Archives, the Bombay University Library and the Timas of India library in Bombay; at the National Archives and the office of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in New Delhi; at the National Library in Calcutta (and to A.N. and P.N. Sapru for their permission to consult the Sapru papers there) and the Maha Bodhi library in Calcutta; at the India Office Library and the British Museum in London; and in the United States, at the Library of Congress, the New York Public Library, the libraries of the University of Penn

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liii sylvania and Columbia University, and the Ames Library at the Univer­ sity of Minnesota

Miss Mildred Drescher, now of Grand Rapids, Michigan, added to my knowledge both with material and with an American perspective of Dr. Ambedkar and the movement in Bombay in the late 1930's and early 1940's.

My typist, Mrs. Darlene Bishop, has handled this

unfamiliar material with speed and efficiency.

I am also grateful

to my advisor, Dr. Holden Furber, for his constant and cheerful support.

-Eleanor Zelliot Minneapolis, Minnesota 1969

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INTRODUCTION

Between 1890 and 1956, the Mahar caste of Maharashtra experienced a political awakening, a development of unity, and a push for equal rights with higher castes which mark the caste out as unique among Untouchable groups.

The Mahar uniqueness does not lie in the

nature of their response to 19th and 20th century political and economic forces in India; other low castes used political means to gain status, developed caste unity and asserted their rights on the social scene. The Mahar accomplishment is in the totality of their movement.

The

political awakening not only involved the Mahars in political processes, but also produced a series of political parties and a leader of allIndia fame.

The development of unity tied the village Mahar to his

town brother so that mass action unprecedented among Untouchables was possible.

The push for rights was not an effort to move up a notch in

the social system but a leap for the top, an attempt aided not by traditional methods of social betterment but by modern means. Now, twenty years after Independence, in a day when many of India’s Untouchables have experienced the benefits of an egalitarian government policy, the institutions raised up by the Mahar movement stand alone as efforts made by an Untouchable caste itself for its own welfare.

The All India Republican Party, the Euddhist conversion

movement, the schools and colleges of the People's Education Society all include others than Mahars but were created by the energy and

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ambition of the Mahar movement.

There are parallel institutions in

other segments of Indian society, but there is no other Untouchable caste with a similar record of accomplishment. The why and how of the Mahar movement go back beyond the year 1890, the year which saw the beginning of articulate protest among the Mahars• The movement continues beyond 1956, the year of the death of Dr. B. B. Ambedkar, unquestioned leader of the Mahars during the thirty most productive years of the movement.

Documentation of modern Mahar

caste history from its own sources, however, begins in 1890, and the chief institutions and directions of the caste were set before Ambedkar's death in 1956.

This study attempts to record Mahar history

as far as possible from its own documents.

The life of the elite in

Maharashtra, the burgeoning nationalism in Indian thought, the changing policies of the British government are all part of common knowledge. The history of a dynamic low caste movement within the larger picture is a necessary addition to Indian history. The first Mahar document heralding a new movement toward higher status was noted in the Bombay newspaper, Indu Prakash, in May, 1890.^ The paper reported that "the disadvantaged are raising their voice," and quoted as evidence a protest addressed to the leaders of Hindu society by Gopal Baba Walangkar, a retired Mahar army officer.

In

language "vigorous...tho' not always correct," Walangkar listed the disadvantages of the Untouchables:

difficulty in getting education,

exclusion from dharmshalas (pilgrims' and travellers'guest houses,) 1Ipdu Prakash (Bombay, May 5, 1890), p. U.

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discrimination while travelling, bans on participation in trade, social stigma even when army service pay might allow them to better their condition, revulsion toward them because of their handling of dead cattle.

Walangkar suggested no specific remedy.

The long process of

petitioning for justice, however, had begun. Within a year of Walangkar's appeal, Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, the guiding force of the Mahar movement from his manhood to his death, was born in an army family related to Walangkar's.

The fact that both

Walangkar, the boldest of 19th century Mahar leaders, and Ambedkar, by far the most important of 20th century Mahar figures, came from an army background offers the first clue to the Mahar dynamic.

Both men were

freed from the traditional subservient role of the village Mahar.

Both

were part of a non-traditional elite produced by social and economic processes set in motion when British domination extended over the Maharashtra area. The traditional role of the Mahar caste was that of village servant. 4 m *9

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Mahars had no special skill or craft, but performed necessary duties for the village as watchmen, wall-menders, street-sweepers, removers of cattle carcasses, caretakers of the burning ground, servants of any passing government official.

Grain and gifts in kind from the village,

the produce from the plot of land that was his by virtue of his hereditary village service, and remuneration from field labor formed the Mahar income.

Mahar service was essential for the village; his

status was low, his work menial, but his place was secure.

With the

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\

-In­ coming of the British and the spread of new ways of administration and communication, the Mahar place in the village grew less important. Concomitant with the diminishing of his village duties, however, were new opportunities in road and "bridge "building, on the railroad lines, in the mills and ammunition factories, and, especially important, in the Indian armies of the British.

These were all occupations that

freed the Mahar from his usual subservient role.

It was from the

educated members of this non-traditional Mahar group that new leadership arose.

Their following came from those Mahars whose identity no longer

was tied to a traditional village role. The movement's beginning rests on economic change.

Its

direction reflects the social and political forces that shaped Maharashtrian life in the 19th and 20th centuries.

The life of the

Mahar leader, B. R. Ambedkar, was shaped by these forces, and he, in turn, was able to use the energies released by political changes to further Mahar progress.

Born in 1891, almost at the moment of public

protest of Mahar disabilities, Ambedkar was influenced by all the factors, outside and inside his caste, which brought forward the new ambitions of the Mahars.

Free from the traditional village role, his

early life was spent among educated ex-army men, imbued with the pride of soldiers and acquainted with a more sophisticated Hinduism than that found in the village.

His life was spent in urban centers, and he only

once or twice visited the isolated Ratnagiri village in the hills below Bombay City where his distant relatives still live.

The Hindu

reform movement begun in Maharashtra in the middle of the 19th century was almost from the beginning concerned about the education of the

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lower classes, and Ambedkar's extraordinary education was made possible by caste Hindu teachers and princes pricked into action by the intellectual goad of reform.

The Non-Brahman movement of the dominant

agriculturist caste, the Marathas, also touched him.

He claimed

inspiration from Jotiba Phule, the Non-Brahman activist who first formed institutions to protest the power of the Brahmans and the need for equality among all castes. In the twentieth century, another force was added to those already influencing the Mahar movement.

Nationalist agitation, ,i'n

which Untouchables had little interest and no part, won from the British a series of political reforms beginning in 1909-

The

commissions which toured India preparatory to the granting of the reforms, however, provided the lower castes with a platform for the S

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Percentage in traditional occupation 55$ 13.05$

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It is incorrect, however, to picture a widespread Mahar movement to cities and urban occupations.

Census figures in the

present day show that the Mahar caste is less urbanized than the Chambhars, and that all Untouchables are less urbanized than Maharashtrians as a whole.^

The significance of 19th century

economic change in the Bombay Presidency lies in the fact that freedom from the traditional role produced a group ready for education and dissatisfied with their village status.

From this

Poona Mahar servant other than Kamble participated in the early Mahar movement, but contemporary Mahars and Buddhists are reluctant to speak of any connection with this earlier occupation. ^ Census of India. 1921, Vol. VIII, Bombay Presidency, Part II. (Tables), (Bombay: Government Central Press, 1922), p. 363. The figures for those fully and partly dependent upon traditional occupa­ tions have been combined. Unfortunately, no definition is given for "traditional occupation," which makes the statistics suggestive of change rather than definitive proof of change. ^Current figures on urban percentages show: Total Scheduled Castes 21.80$ Chambhar 28.27 Mang 15 -58 Mahar 13.81 Total Maharashtra pop. 28.22 Census of India. 1961, Vol. X, 5-A, pp. 32-33. Unfortunately, no rural-urban breakdown is given for Buddhists. The 1931 Census for Bombay Presidency does not give ruralurban breakdown by caste.

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group came leaders able to communicate not only with the new Mahar but also with those retaining their village tie. In the Vidarbha area, another change took place in the 19th century which enabled the Mahars in those districts to equal or surpass their western kinsmen in economic progress and ambition. The social structure of the eastern area already had allowed greater latitude to Mahar labor.

Weaving and trading on a small scale were

the occupations of numbers of Mahars, a phenomenon perhaps made necessary by the greater percentage of Mahars in the population and the consequent impossibility of all of them serving as village balutedars. The balutedgrs themselves. in addition, took part in the economic changes that came about in the cotton-growing areas. As the American Civil War cut off cotton supplies to England, a cotton boom in India forced a cash economy on many eastern Maharashtrian areas.^ By the turn of the century, Mahar village service had been put on a cash basis on the cotton-growing areas of Berar and the Central Provinces.

A cess was placed on crops for the wages of the

village KotwSl, who was invariably a Mahar, and the position was made over to a single man, making illegal the practice of Mahar families serving in turn. 59 ^®See Peter Harnety, "The American Civil War and the Export of Indian Cotton,",Assoc, for Asian Studies (March 196?), mimeo. ^The Berar Land Revenue Code for 1928, compiled by K. V. Brahma (Amraoti: K. V. Brahms, 1932), gives a new cess for Jaglia (assistant to the headman) and Mahar service, tracing the history of cash payments back to a time after the American Civil War. See p. 195-202, for the full legal arrangement.

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The double advantage of several occupational opportunities and a regularized wage for a limited number of Mahars in the village produced a recognized upward movement in eastern Mahars.

The 1899

Nagpur Land Settlement Report noted this movement and made an accurate prophecy: They [Mahars] turn their hands to anything and everything. Some have taken to carpentry, others to dyeing. But the great majority are cultivators and agricultural labour...Nevertheless, Mahars will not remain for years down-trodden in this fashion, and are already pushing themselves up from this state of degradation. In some places they have joined together to dig wells. They have in the city established a school of their own for their community. One now-a-dsys sometimes finds a Mahar the most prosperous man in the village; he occasionally takes to trade and contracts; the Nagpur Patwari staff for a time had at least one Mahar among its members. The rise of the Mahar will probably be one of the features of social change in this district during the next fifty or a hundred years. He at present lacks education and a sense of self respect, but these will cornerand the day may not be far distant when .a Mahar will be found among the ranks of the native magistrates. 0 While the army service and urban occupations of western Mahars produced a group ambitious to change Mahar status and capable of sophisticated political leadership, economic changes in the east of Maharashtra also allowed the rise of village and city Mahars to a new level of activity.

The disruption of traditional duties and the

British-born new occupational opportunities in the 19th century came in differing ways to eastern and western Mahars, but the total result was to prepare the ground for a unified movement. ^Report of the Land Revenue Settlement of the Nagpur District in the Central Provinces, effected during the years 1890 - 1895* compiled by R. H. Craddock (Nagpur, 1899)» P* 28. The revised system of remuneration is described on pp. 222 - 221+.

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The Effect of the Social Reform Movement - Educational Opportunities Tvo streams of social reform, one among Non-Brahmans and one led by the Brahman elite, began to affect the Maharashtrian scene in the mid-nineteenth century.

Both, somewhat slowly but to a greater

degree than in any other area of India,^ touched the Untouchable masses.

The Mahar freed from village service sought education.

His

owp efforts plus the opportunities offered by social reformers allowed him to overcome the traditional barriers to learning.

Social custom

set up restrictions which were not completely obliterated until the 191+0's, but some opportunities were available to the Mahar as early as the mid-19th century. Mahars in the army and those near Christian mission schools, a small minority of the total community, may have had educational opportunities even earlier, but the first schools specifically for Untouchables were opened in 1852 in Poona by a Non-Brahman social reformer.

Jociba Govindrao Phule,

a member of the agriculturist Mali

A thesis I have not been able to develop fully is that the chief Maharashtrian social reform group, the Prarthana Samaj, in contrast to both the Brahmo Samaj centered in Bengal and the Arya Samaj of Punjab, created an attitude toward the Untouchable that was conducive to the formation of a forceful movement among Untouchables themselves. The Brahmos conducted schools for the lower classes, but these rarely joined the Brahmo Samaj. (See Satis Chandra Chakravarti and Sarojendra Nath Ray (compilers), Brahmo Samaj, The Depressed Classes and Untouchability. (Calcutta: Sadharan Brahmo Samaj, 1933.) Tile Ax“jrS Samaj concerned itself at first with"shuddhi (purification) of Untouchables, later with education. ^For studies of Phule's life and influence, see Dnananjay Keer, Mahatma Jotlrao Phooley (Bombay: Popular Prakashan, 1961+) and Laxman Shastri Joshi, "Jyotirao Fule, 1827-1890," in Rationalists of Maharashtra (Calcutta: Indian RenaissanceInstitute, 19^2).

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caste, is chiefly known as the earliest leader of the Non-Brahman /•

movement.

He began the Satyashodak Samaj (Truth-Seeking Society) in

1870 to try to stir the Non-Brahman masses to self-respect and ambition.

Even earlier, however, he established schools for two

neglected groups, girls and the Depressed Classes.

These schools

were short-lived, and although they educated several dozen Mahars, there seems to be no on-going influence from this early effort. Phule’s approach to social problems was, however, to have an effect on later reformers.

An educational authority writes, "As

time passed on, it was his teachings rather than that of any other contemporary, that began to dominate the scene in Maharashtra." Within the Non-Brahman movement itself, two other reformers also stressed education.

The Maharaja of Kolhapur extended his educational

efforts to Mahars as well as his fellow Marathas in an effort to raise other castes to a level of competition with the Brahmans. 6I1 Kolhapur's direct aid to the Mahar took the fom of a hostel in 1909 and later financial support to Dr. B. R. Ambedkar during the early days of Ambedkar's movement.

The proper successor of "Mahatma Phule" in

educational matters, however, was Bhaurao Patil, a Jain from the Satara ^Syed Nurullah and J. P. Naik, History of Education in India (Bombay: Macmillan, 1951)> P* 202. This is an excellent source for the study of education in Maharashtra; particular attention is paid to reform movements and the progress of Untouchables. 6U See Annaji Babaji Latthe, Memoirs of H. H. Chhatrapati-Maharaja of Kolhapur, 2 vols. (Bombay: India Press, 192V,) for a full study of the Maharaja (187H-I922), an heir of the house of Shivaji and one of the Non-Brahman movement.

Shri Shanhu Times of of Kolhapur of the leaders

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-LLarea, who began work in the 1920's.^

The wide-spread net of educa­

tional institutions he created in a remarkable one-man effort changed the face of southern Maharashtra, providing education for thousands of Marathas and Mahars. A Maratha related not to the Non-Brahman movement but to the high caste Prarthana Samaj (Prayer Society), however, was the chief instrument of the elitist reform movement in the service of the lower castes.

Vithal Ramji Shinde's network of schools and hostels,

numbering thirty at the peak of the movement, was begun in 1906. Their importance can be seen in 1916 educational statistics for Bombay city. Of 1600 Depressed Class children in school in Bombay City, nearly a third of that number, 500 children, were enrolled in Shinde's Depressed Class Mission schools.

66

These caste Hindu efforts in the early 20th century were not so much charity done to the Untouchables as efforts to respond to Untouchables' demands. Shinde himself indicated that his decision to work in this area of social, reform was made in response to initiative in the Mahar community.

He recorded in a history of the Depressed

Class Mission Society that he had earlier observed "interesting move­ ments of self improvement" such as the Somawanshiya Samaj started in Poona by S. J. Kamble, the Mohapa Low Caste Association begun by ^ A n j i l v e l v. Matthew's biography, Bhaurao Patil- (Satara: F.ayat Shikshan Sanstha, 1957. Foreword by D. R. Gadgil) gives a full account of Patil's educational activities.

^°"The Depressed Classes in Bombay" (by a Depressed Class Mission worker), in Social Service Quarterly, Vol. II, No. 1 (July, 1916), pp. 35-^1. The 1600 Depressed Class children in school represent over ten percent of the 13,500 Depressed Class school-age population.

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Kisan Fago of Nagpur, and the Somawanshiya Hitachintak Mandali of Ahmednagar whose leaders were Shripatrao Thorat and Pandoha Dangle. Shinde felt that it was necessary "for the Social Reform Association and the Prarthana Samaj of Bombay to devise means to bring both these new forces [i.e. the reform efforts of the caste Hindus and those of the Untouchables themselves] Into a happy and new cooperation."' The egalitarian attitude of these reformers must be noted as well as their actual institutions for education.

It is possible

that the work of the reformers in creating a consciousness of injustice and a need for reform in the Maharashtrian mind was more important than their actual institutions.

Aside from Shinde's institutions, the

Prarthana Samaj leaders did not create educational opportunities for the Untouchables. They did, however, allow Untouchables into the 68 Samaj itself and their intellectual influence was to aid in creating conditions leading to radical reform.

Early and strong condemnation

of untouchability can be found in the writings of Prarthana Samaj leaders who were also important political figures or scholars: Mahadev Govind Ranade, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, R. G. Bhandarkar.

69

The most radical of the Brahman reformers was Gopal Ganesh Agarkar, 6Tv. R. Shinde, The Theistic Directory (Bombay: Depressed Class Mission, 1912), pp. 61-62. There is no study in English of Shinde's life or work. 6ft Shinde, The Theistic Directory, pp. 139-153, notes that Samajes in the Byculla area of Bombay, Kolhapur and Satara either included Depressed Class members or were composed of Mahars. ^9see Sir Ramakrishna Gopal Bhandarkar, "The Depressed Classes" in The Indian Review, Vol. XIV, 1913, pp. It82-i85, and Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Treatment of Indians by the Boere and Treatment of the Low Castes in India by Their. Own Countrymen (London: Christian Literature Society, 1903.)

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whose influence seems to have penetrated every corner cf Maharashtra,"^® hut who himself created no institutions.

While the thinking of these

reformers was far in advance even of the main body of the Prarthana Samaj (Shinde's Depressed Class Mission Society had to be founded outside the auspices of that body),

7T_

it represented a caste Hindu

attitude which led to cooperation with Untouchables, rather than service to Untouchables.

Mohandas K. Gandhi noticed this in 1915

during a meeting of the Servants of India Society in Poona.

When he

was told of the program of the group in regard to Untouchables, he said, "I am afraid you will make Harijans rise in rebellion against society."

Hari Narayan Apte, a member of the Society, told him, "Yes,

let there be a rebellion.

That is just what I want."72

The attitudes of caste Hindu reformers, both Brahman and NonBrahman, led to an encouragement of initiative among Untouchables themselves.

Schools had been started by Mahars in the Berar and

Nagpur- areas in the late 19th century.

Efforts in the Desh began a

^"®G. K. Agarkar (I856-I895) wrote almost entirely in Marathi and is little^known outside Maharashtra. His early death may have prevented the development of specific reform institutions. However, the most radical of caste Hindu reformers in all parts of Maharashtra seem to be disciples of Agarkar. 71

1 Vithal Ramji Shinde resigned from the Prarthana Samaj when his Depressed Classes Mission Society was not fully supported by its members, but the Mission itself is an outgrowth of his association with the Samaj. See Sivanath Sastri, History of the Brahmo Samaj, 2 Vol. (Calcutta: Chatterji, 1911-12). "^Mahadeo Desai, The Diary of Mahadeo Desai (Ahmedabad: Havajivan, 1953,) p. 52-53^ The incident is reported at a later date by Gandhi secretary after a conversation with Gandhi. The Servants of India Society was founded by Gokhale in 1905. Although not a religious organization, it included Maharashtrians related intellectually to the Prarthana Samaj.

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little later.

By the time the Bombay Government was ready to under­

write full scale public education, however, Mahars were ready to take full advantage of it. The British Government in Bombay in the 19th century had seemed somewhat less eager than caste Hindu reformers to provide for Untouchable education.

As earlier noted, Governor Mountstuart

Elphinstone had observed in 1821 that the lower castes made good students, but went on to warn against special encouragement to them. "They are not only the most despised, but among the least numerous of the great divisions of society, and it is to be feared that if our system of education first took root among them, it would never spread further."73

This self-protective attitude was maintained at least

through the 1850's.

In the middle of that decade, a Mahar boy in

Dharwar applied to a government school for entrance.

Refused

admission, he appealed to the Education Department of Bombay Province in 1856 but vas rejected on the grounds that "it would not be right for the sake of a single individual, the only Mahar who had ever yet come forward to beg for admission into a school attended only by pupils of caste, to force him into association with them, at the probable risk of making the institution practically useless to the great mass of n a t i v e s . A further petition was made to the Government of India at Calcutta, which upheld the decision of the Department of Education, ^Mountstuart Elphinstone, "Minute on Education" in Selections... , p. 105"^"Report of the Department of Public Instruction, Bombay, 1856-57,” quoted in Nurullah and ITaik, History of Education... . pp. U21-U22.

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but added a caustic note that "the boy would not have been refused admission to any Government School in the''Presidency of Bengal. Shortly after, the Court of Directors passed an order opening government schools to all classes, but "the opposition of the higher castes to the admission of [Untouchable] boys to a public school was often so strong that, even with the best will in the world, the Department could do very little in the ma tt e r . S e p a r a t e schools offered one kind of solution, and a net-work of such schools was widespread in Madras, but in the Maharashtra area the number of separate schools was never large.

In 1882 there were lo special

schools for Untouchables in Bombay Province with 561* pupils, and four m the Central Provinoes with 111 pupils.

77

The situation

improved somewhat toward the end of the century, but government efforts were weak in comparison with those of the more diligent reformers.

In

the last quarter of the 19th century, the Gaikwad of Baroda, whose re­ form in all matters was remarkable, opened eighteen special schools for Untouchables in his own S t a t e . I t was not until the 1920’s that Untouchable students in public schools could be numbered in the thousands, and by that time the Untouchable demand was not for charity, but for free compulsory primary education for all children. Mahar efforts to become educated, which seemed to go- hand in "^Government Qf India letter No. Ill, dated 23 January 1857, quoted in Nurallah and Naik, History of Education..., p. 1+22. "Report of the Department of Public Instruction," quoted in Nurullah and Naik, History of Education..., p. 1+22. ^Nurullah and Naik, History of Education... , p. 1*23. ^®Kurullah and Naik, History of Education..., p. 589*

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hand with their new economic opportunities, pushed them not only into government and private reformers' schools, but brought them into a growing effort to provide schools and hostels for themselves. numbers affected, however, were small.

The

The percentage of Mahar

literates did not reach over three percent until the 1930!s. Education for potential leaders was, however, possible, an impulse toward education could be found in most areas of Maharashtra, and the attitudes of both Mahar reformers and caste Hindu reformers encouraged the attainment of education. The Legitimization of Ambition As Mahars began to produce a non-traditional group, as they entered into education and new occupations, a primary need was the legitimization of their ambition, a myth or a legend which would give them a higher status in the varpa system, or which would explain their fall to the despised place which they now resented. Given their history and the Maharashtrian milieu, three explanations were open to them:

the claim of being pre-Aryan, former "Lords

of the Land," reduced to their present low stature by their conquerors; the claim of Kshatriya status, former warriors brought low by an ancient calamity; the claim of religious worth in their lUth century saint, Cokhamela, one of the beloved poets of the bhakti movement. All three possibilities were rejected as viable justification for modernization in the Ambedkar period of leadership.

The last two

claims, however, of martial valor and religious worth, are of such importance to the Mahar ^lan even though they failed to suffice as the Mahar movement's legitimization, that they will be dealt with at length.

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The possibility of building pride and status on the claim of being pre-Aryan was attempted among the Mahars as early as 189k» when a petition to government for the reintroduction of Untouchable recruitment was drawn up in the name of the Anarya Doshparihar Mandali (the Non-Aryan Group for Removal of Wrongs.)

The idea of Mahars

as former "Lords of the Land" was later also used by a Mahar leader, Kisan Fagoji Bansode of Nagpur, to urge the Mahars to greater selfrespect and courage in seeking their religious and social rights. There was some evidence in Mahar village duties for considering the Mahars as early inhabitants of Maharashtra — the care of the village goddess Mariai, the arbitration of land disputes and the expectation that the Mahar would be an authority on boundaries.

Many writers,

both Indian and British, held that the Mahars were an absorbed tribal people, and a number, chiefly British, came to the conclusion that the very name Maharashtra meant "country of the Mahars."

79

The concept of

early inhabitation and racial separation from the dominant Hindu castes played a large part in the Untouchable movement in Madras and in the "^Almost all Indian and British authorities indicate that the Mahars were pre-Aryan or tribal groups. The claim that the name Maharashtra is derived from "country of the Mahars" has also been put forward by a number of British authorities, but is denied by most Indian writers. C. A. Kincaid, in The preface of The Tale of the Tulsi Plant and Other Studies (Bombay: Times of India Office, 190F), states that an earlier edition of his essay on Maratha Proverbs contained a reference to Maharashtra as the country of the Mahars, but this had caused offense and he had withdrawn it. He states that R. G. Bhandarkar convinced him this etomology was linguistically incorrect. Two synonyms for Mahar recorded by Enthoven which mean "sons of the soil," Bhumlputra and pharnicheput, might also be used to bolster the original inhabitant concept, but these compete with thirteen other terms which connote occupation or refer to low status, and in them­ selves they cannot be read to indicate previous overlordship of the land.

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Punjab, especially in the 1920's when Adi-Dravida (pre-Dravidian) for the southern Untouchable and Ad-Dharm (pre-Hindu) for the northern Untouchable were widely used by those groups in an effort to justify separate political representation.^

Any deep belief on the part of

Mahars, however, was kept from surfacing by Dr. Ambedkar, who denied that a racial difference marked off Untouchables. 81

The concept of

"Lords of the Land" or "First Inhabitants" may be retained in the community mind,

82

but it was never allowed to serve either the social

or political purposes of the community after Ambedkar assumed leadership. The Mahar Army Tradition The 1931 Census for the Central Provinces and Berar notes unofficially through a report from the Deputy Commissioner in Amraoti that Marathas, Telis and Malis in the district referred to themselves as Kshatriya Maratha, Kshatriya Teli and Kshatriya Mali, fin The name "Adi-Dravida" became a Census designation in 1931. In Punjab, U00,000 Untouchables, chiefly Cramars and Churas, registered themselves as "Ad-Dharm" in the 1931 Census in an organized effort to claim special status. fiT During the Simon Commission's tour in 1928, Dr. Ambedkar answered a direct question about his caste being pre-Aryan with "That is an opinion. I do not know." Great Britain. Indian Statutory Commission. Vol. XVI. Selections from Memoranda and Oral Evidence by Non-Officials, Part I (London: H.M.S.O., 1930), p. 5^. He later evolved a theory of Untouchables as former Buddhists. See The Untouchables. (Who were they and why they became Untouchables). (New Delhi: Amrit Book Co., 19^8). ftp

Dadasaheb Gaikwad, long time lieutenant of Dr. Ambedkar and current head of the original core of the Republican Party, in a recent news interview referred to his group as "the original people of Maharashtra," (maharaeh^rgtil mSl sthanik lok). MahSrSshtra Taims, (Bombay, September 18, 1967).

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"and even, I am informed, in seme cases [the Mahar calls himself] QO Kshatriya Mahar." But such a claim is not recorded in official lists of claims to new caste names anywhere in the Maharashtra area, and for good reason.

Such a claim had little prospect of

success in Maharashtra, where the Marathas themselves, men of higher status who had produced a King and a Kingdom, had to fight a continual battle for recognition as warrior-caste.

There is

some suggestion that even the advanced castes, the Pathare Prabhu and Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhu, had to content themselves with the fact that in most Brahman minds they were Shudras. The Walangkar petition of 189^ from the "non-Aryan group in Dapoli," however, added the somewhat inconsistent claim of former Kshatriya-hood in the body of the petition.

According to this, the three Untouchable castes of

Parwari (Mahar-), Moci (Chambhar) and Mang, were at one time Kshatriya, but were demoted by the Peshwa at the time of the Mahadurgadevi famine in 1676 for eating whatever they could find to save their lives. The claim of former Kshatriya status was never a serious part of the Mahar ideology.

Even in the pre-Ambedkarian days of the

movement, petitioning government and pushing for education was the dominant note in its leaders' minds and the Kshatriya model for emulation or the claim of Kshatriya status was not stressed. Mahar military history, on the other hand, became a significant part of caste elan and mythology, and the hundred year period of Mahar recruitment into British armies may well have been the single most ^ Census of India, 1931. Vol. XII, Central India and Berar. Part I - Report (Kagpur: Government Printing, C.P., 1933) p- 329.

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import ant factor, aside from economic reasons, in producing the Mahar movement.

Mahar legends of military prowess go back even further than

the British"period in their search for pride. In the days of Shiva.li, the mid-seventeenth century, Mahar military service seems to have been, for the most part, an extension of their village guard duties.

"Chaatrapati Shivaji employed the

Mahars to watch the jungles at the foot of the hill forts, act as scouts, and kept [sic] the forts supplied with wood and fodder. There is a legend among the Mahars that they had special duties of guarding the palace of Shivaji's mother, Jijabai, at the foot of the capital fort rtaigaa.

A little later, in Peshwa times, these

guard duties were expanded into actual field combat.

D. D. Gholap,

the first Untouchable representative on the Bombay Legislative Council in 1921, recalled this service with pride:

"Even the most

tyrannical and Brahmanical Feshwas were unquestioned enthusiasts in preserving and encouraging the martial spirit of the Mahars, whose regiments served the Mahratta Empire no less patriotically than O r

what the Tommies do for their fatherland."

C. B. Agarwal tells a

^Major General S. P. P. Thorat, The Regimental History of the Mahar MG Regiment (Dehra Dun: The Army Press) 195*0, p« 3. ®5c. B. Agarwal, Harijans in Rebellion, (Bombay: Taraporevala and Sons, 193^), p. 69. One of the few solid bits of evidence substantiating the claim that the Peshwa used Untouchable soldiers is that it was noted during the time of testimony to the Simon Commission that there was a Depressed Classes voter in the list of Sardars and Inamdars (holders of land by decree) whose jagir (land over which he has authority) was granted by the Peshwa for services on the battlefield. Indian Statutory Commission Vol. XVI, Selections from Memoranda and Oral Evidence by Non-Officials, Part I (London: H.M.S.O., 1930), p. 58.

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story which seems to indicate that the factor of untouchability was surmounted by military necessity: Shidnath Mahar came to Kharda and pitched his tent beside those of the Brahmins and the Mahrattas. Naturally the Sardars did not like it. The complaint ultimately reached the ear of Sawai Madhawrao. Hiroji Patankar, an old Mahratta Sardar, was sitting next to the Peshwa. The Peshwa listened to the complaint and looked at Patankar. Patankar said, 'This is not a dinner party. It is a party of warriors. There is no pollution or untouchability here.' The Peshwa gave his decision. The camp of the Mahars was to remain where it was... In the battle of Wasai, Tuknath Mahar fought gloriously and was amply awarded by the Peshwa. The researches of Mr. Aba Chandorkar have definitely established that the untouchables had many Pathaks or units of their own in the army. An official regimental history of the Mahar Machine Gun Regiment established during the Second World War emphasizes the part Mahars played in the early British armies.

"Writing in the

18th century, John Jacob could say, ’In the Bombay Army, the Brahmin stands shoulder to shoulder in the ranks, nay sleeps in the same tent with his Purwaree [Mahar] fellow soldier and dreams not of any objection to this arrangement.1 The early Bombay Army of the l8th and 19th centuries was not predominantly composed of Marathas but of Mahars...It was only after the British had obtained a foothold in the Deccan by the Treaty of Bassein (1802) that large scale recruitment of the Marathas and the Deccani Muslims started. The old Bombay Army was composed chiefly of Marathas and Mahars or as they were then called Parwaries, and they formed the backbone of the force.

S ^ A g a r w a l,

Harijans in Rebellion, p. 68.

SfThorat, Regimental History... , p. 3-1.

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The few available statistics on the caste composition of British military units show a significant number of Mahars enlisted.

The earliest, a report of Bahirav Raghunath to Nana

Phadnis, of the Peshwa's Court, notes that Charles Warre Malet, an Englishman coming to Poona to serve as an envoy around 1790, moved up from Bombay through the ghats accompanied by "six topiwalas [Englishmen] ... 35 horses, 200 guards, 100 servants, 50 Kamathi porters, 75 palanquin men, b25 Mahars, 2 elephants, QO

k palanquins" and a Muslim dancing girl.

Since servants and

guards are listed separately, the function of the Mahars must have been as a potential armed force.

In the regular British army, the

Mahars were recruited heavily in the Marine Battalion and the Pioneers.

In the 107th Pioneers (circa l8ll), the list includes

256 Parwaris (Mahars), 30 Mochees (Chambhars), and 387 Marathas out of a total of 106L.®^

A figure from the later part of the

century gives the number of Mahars in the army from Ratnagiri, the area from which most army Mahar families seem to have come:

"In the

Ratnagiri Gazette of 1880 it was stated:-'Large numbers [of Mahars] entered the army and have always proved obedient, hardy and brave soldiers.

There are 2180 Ratnagiri Mahars on the army rolls.

A military monument at Koregaon, a village near Poona, serves as a focal point in the legend of Mahar heroism.

The Koregaon pillar

Pfl >-'uC. A. Kincaid, The Tale of the Tulsi Plant, 2nd. ed. D. B. Taraporevala and sons, 191&), pp. 123-124.

(Bombay:

89 Lt. Col. W. B. P. Tugwell, History of The Bombay Pioneers (London: Sidney Press, 1938), Appendix 2., p. 373-3759°Thorat, Regimental History, p. k.

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commemorates the soldiers of the British army who fell during one of the decisive battles in l3l8 against the Peshwa of the Maratha Empire. A small number of soldiers, English and Indian, caught without food or water, successfully defended the spot against the full force of the Peshwa's army.

Of the ^9 names of the 2nd/lst Regiment recorded on

the pillar, 22 are Parwari (identifiable as Mahars by the nak ending), sixteen are Maratha, eight Rajput and other Hindu, two Muslim and one probably Indian Jewish.''°1 The Koregaon monument was used as a gathering~place for Mahar meetings in the 1920's and 1930rs. with the memorial to Mahar soldiers who had fought a victorious battle serving as inspiration for a more modem struggle. The recruitment of Mahars was stopped with the abolition of the old Presidency armies, and from 1892 to 18955 various batallions eliminated Mahar recruits.

Recruits from Untouchable castes were no

longer accepted as the army moved toward a "martial race" concept of army organization.

There may also have been a decline in enlistments

as Mahars entered the mills of Bombay which justified this change in recruitment policy.

The blocking of the army road to progress for the

Mahars was, however, bitterly resented.

The first attempt to organize

for some sort of political action came as a result of the closing of recruitment, and a plea for reinstatement was a part of almost all Mahar petitions from the earliest days of the movement until a Mahar batalliou was established again in 19^2. ^1Sir Patrick Cadell, History of the Bombay Army (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1938), pp. 15^155. The cap badge,of the Mahar Regiment from its founding in 19^2 until independence bore a replica of the Koregaon memorial and the word "Koregaon."

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The author of the first Mahar petition of grievances in 1890 was Gopal Baba Walangkar, a retired Ratnagiri army man.

He also,

since his retirement from the army, had attempted to institute a movement among Mahars to encourage Mahar holy men to replace Brahman joshis, astrologers whose establishment of auspicious wedding dates was the only function performed by Brahmans for the Mahars.

He also established the first Untouchable newspaper,

Vital Vidhvagsak, in 1888.^

After the closing of recruitment

for Mahars and other Untouchables, Walangkar circulated a long petition repeating some of the grievances he had attempted to publicize earlier and asking for recruitment in army, police and civil administration.

The memoirs of Vithal Ramji Shinde, the

Maratha educator, tell something of Walangkar’s efforts and their result: Up to this time, we have mentioned only that movement which the Touc'nabies began for the Untouchables. But then the Untouchables themselves began a movement for self-respect. Earlier, Untouchables were recruited into the British army. This was stopped. About 1890-1891 new recruitment of Mahars and Chambhars ceased. Later, those already in service were asked to leave. A first attempt to redress these grievances was made with great persistence by pensioner Havaldar Gopalnak Viththalnak Walangkar of the village of Randul in Mahad Taluka, then an old man. M. Jotiba Phule and Baba Padmaji and others guided and helped him. In the year 1895, at the time the Congress gathered in Poona, he started a movement. He did much work in Dapoli [Ratnagiri] District in the localities where the Untouchable caste Chambhar and Mahar pensioners lived. But because of the newness of the movement it was not successful. He drew up a peti­ tion to the Government, but the pensioners at that time did not s. Ranpise, DalitahcT Vrattpatre (The Newspapers of the Depressed Classes) (Bombay: Bhausaheb Adsul, 1962), p. 9- As far as I know, no copy of Walangkar’s paper is extant.

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even have the courage to sign the petition. The movement was carried on further by Poona's Shivram Janba Karible with great persistence from 1903 - 1910. It is still going on. ^ /

Walangkar's petition is a long, discursive document, followed by a poem in the forthright bhakti style which castigates both Mahar religious practices and the Brahmans who have held them to their low place.

Although the petition is presented in the name

of the Anarya Doshparihar Mandali (Non-Aryan Group for Removal of Wrongs) at Dapoli and contains a reference to the Untouchable castes as former Kshatriya, its main weight is to recall the bravery and usefulness of the Untouchable soldier and army attendant and to prove that no caste is pure or justified in curtailing the freedom of another.

The British

are reminded that in early times half the army came from so-called Untouchable castes, and that these castes did not change sides at the time of the Mutiny.

Much of the petition seems addressed not to the /

British but to high caste Hindus.

According to Walangkar, army

education has caused the Untouchables to question the behavior, ideology and origin of the Hindus, and they have learned that high caste people from the South were "Australian-semitic non-Aryans" and African Negroes, that Chitpavan Brahmans were "Barbary Jews," that the high caste Marathas'' forebears were "Turks." God brought in foreigners to rule.

To punish these people,

An appeal (the 1890 statement given

publicity in Iiydu PrakUsh,) Walangkar stated, had been made to the Hindus, asking what remedies in Hinduism there were to remove the lowness of the Untouchables, but it was not answered.

Walangkar then

^Karmavxr Viththal H§mjl Shinde, MajhyS Athvagi va Anubhav [My Memories and Experiences] (Poona: P. B. Andre, 1958), p. 2lit.

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threat ened conversion:

"We are about to adopt that religion of one

God in which there is not high or low."

The petition then stated that

Untouchables do not want the government to "go into the hands of villains," and characterized Congress as "those who believe, according to their scriptures, they will get the government in their own hands." The basic plea was that Untouchables be recruited in army, police and civil administration, with an undertone of request that the British, where they have authority such as in the army, should force equal treatment .914

-

A subsequent petition sent by Shivram Janba Kamble and Poona Mahars involves another generation of leaders.

The full admission of

Mahars back into the any, and into police and civil administration as well according to Walangkar's plea, was achieved in the 19^+0's at the height of Ambedkar's power. Although Walangkar's petition was so in advance of its time that his fellow pensioners at Dapoli would not sign it, he does not stand alone as an example of the army's influence.

Associated with

the later movement'of Shivram Janba Kamble were Subhedar (Captain), Bahadur Gangaram Krishnajee and Subhedar R. S. Ghatge.

An ex-army

man was active in the satyagrahafor water rights held in the Ratnagiri area in 1927.

And in the Nagpur

area, where the army

connection does

not seem to have been so strong, the martial image of the Mahar soldier was also raised as an example ofproven worth. Ambedkar himself, possibly because of the army background of hand-written copy of the petition in Marathi which had been in the possession of Dr. Ambedkar is now in the Ambedkar collection of C. B. Khairmoday at the Bombay University Library.

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his own family, gave almost sole credit for the Untouchables' movement toward higher status to the contact with the army: Until the advent of the British, the Untouchables were content to remain Untouchables. It was a destiny preordained by the Hindu God and enforced by the Hindu State. As such there was no escape from it. Fortunately or unfortunately, the East India Company needed soldiers for their army in India and it could find none but the Untouchables. The East India Company's army consisted at any rate in the early part of its history, of the Untouchables and although the Untouchables are now included among the non-martial classes and are therefore excluded from the Army, it is with the help of an army composed of Untouchables that the British conquered India. In the army of the East India Company there prevailed the system of compulsory education for Indian soldiers and their children, both male and female. The education received by the Untouchables in the army while it was open to them gave them one advantage which they never had before. It gave them a new vision and a new value. They became conscious that the low esteem in which they had been held was not an inescapable destiny but was a stigma imposed on their personality by the cunning contrivances of the priest. They felt the shame of it as they never did before and were determined to get rid of it.95 Cokhamela and the Mahar Religious Past In addition to a legend of former land ownership and the much cherished military past, the Mahar could have chosen from a third heritage for a traditional legitimization of his modern movement. The bhakti movement beginning in the 13th century allowed Mahars to participate on a plane of spiritual, if not social, equality, and out of that movement came a Mahar who is celebrated as one of the great 95b . R. Ambedkar, What, Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables 2nd, ed. , (Bombay: Thacker and Co., Ltd., 19^), p. 189For a record of the British use of Untouchables in the army, and the effect of that recruitment on the Untouchable community, see Stephen P. Cohen, "The Untouchable Soldier: Caste, Politics and the Indian Army," Journal of Asian Studies, forthcoming.

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medieval poet saints, Cokhamela. The Chamars of the United Provinces^96 07

and the Chambhars of Maharashtra

have used the -name of their bhakti

saint, Raidas or Rohidas, as an emblem of self-respect and religious worth.

The same impulse was strong in the Mahars, but even this

promising channel was blocked in favor of non-traditional ways.

The

heritage of the bhakti movement retained some importance for the Mahars, however, and also influenced the modern milieu of social reform in which the Mahar movement took shape. Cokhamela was one of the poet-saints in the Pandharpur pan­ theon, the group of devotees whose worship of the God Viththal (Vithoba or Vithu are also used as derivative forms) resulted in the still popular "Cult of Vithoba" and a great body of devotional poetry. Cokha the Mahar takes his place with Uamdev, Eknath, Tukaram and other poet-saints who not cru.y carried the message of bhakti (religious devotion) throughout Maharashtra but formed the medieval literature of the Marathi language with their songs.

Founded by Jnanadev in the

13th century, the bhakti cult produced its last great poet-saint, Tukaram. in the 17th century, but continues to be the strongest religious sect in Maharashtra' today.

Centered around the main temple

of Vithoba at Pandharpur, on the banks of the Bhima, the cult of ■^See Bernard S. Cohn, "The Changing Status of a Depressed Caste," in Village India: Studies in the Little Community, McKim Marriott, Ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1955)* PP* 5^-79. ^The Chambhars of Poona celebrate the birthday of Rohidas with a procession. The connection of Marathi-speaking Chambhars with the Hindi-speaking Chamar saint is an old one. C. A. Kincaid in his translation of the l8th century Bhaktavi.jaya relates the tale of the saint Rohidas who lived in Pandharpur as a devotee. Tales of the Saints of Pandharpur, pp. 9^-95*

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Vithoba draws to it numbers of devotees, called warkari, who make twice yearly pilgrimages to Alandi, Pandharpur, and Dehu, singing the songs of the poet-saints. QR Cokhamela lived near Pandharpur and wrote his devotional songs in the first part of the l^th century.

His samadhi (literally,

place of immolation, but generally meaning memorial) is at the foot of the main gate of the temple of Vithoba in Pandharpur. Cokhamela's songs and the legends about him tell not only of devotion to God but also about the practice of untouchability in that time. Some of the legends are birth stories, but most are illustrative of the bhakti belief that anyone, no matter what his caste, could know God through devotion.

A story in Mahipati's Bhaktaviiaya,

(the Victory of the Bhakta) the classic account of the saints' lives written about the middle of the 18th century, makes this tenet vivid:

The God Vithoba himself one day took Cokhamela into his

temple so that he could worship the image, but when the Brahmans found Cokha there, they drove him away.

In despair, Cokhamela

crossed the river, but the God Vithal came to him there and ate with him.

A Brahman, watching, heard Cokha talking to an unseen guest,

calling him Vithal. and telling him the curds were spilt.

The Brahman

in anger strode up and slapped Cokha's face, but when the Brahman returned to the temple, he found curds spilt on the dress of the idol ^®See Irawati Karve, "On the Road: A Maharashtrian Pilgrimage" Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. XXII, No. I (November 1962), pp. 13-29Father Deleury, author of The Cult of Vithoba, also writes about the pilgrimage from experience.

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Vithal, cuiu. "fciio cheek of the image swollen. QQ7

In this story, as in

others, a Brahman is the villain, Cokhamela is the hero.

Yet the

point seems not to be that untouchability is wrong, but that even untouchability does not bar the way to God. Cokhamela's abhangas (poems in a certain metre) are sung today, not only by pilgrims making their way from Alandi to Pandharpur, but in devotional song programs over the radio.

Many of the abhaqgas

are pure devotional poetry; others are criesof despair over Cok­ hamela's untouchability.

One that may referto the incident above is

Abhanga 5: Run, run, Vithu, don't come slowly. I am beaten by the Badve for some transgression: "How has the garland of Vithoba come to be around your neck?" They abuse me and curse me: "Why have you polluted the God?" I am your dog by the door; don't let me go without favor. 0 Lord of the wheel, you are the creator of our lives. I, Cokha, hands elapsed, beg you, 0 God Don't be angry with my imporcuning.-*-®® In one of Cokhamela's abhaggas, he calls himself "of the inferior caste Mahar," so born because he is a descendant of the Nila who reproached Krishna.101

In another he calls to God, "Why have you

^^Mahipati, Bhaktavijaya [The Victory of the Saints], Vol. 1. Translated by Justin E. Abbott and Nahar R. Godbole. (Poona: N. R. Godbole, 1933) p. 377-381*. ^•^CokhaTnela Abhapg GSthS [Collection of Cokhamela's Songs] Balkrsna Laksman Pathak, 1950), p. 2. This abhang and the ones that follow were first translated for me by Mr- B. S. Shinde of Poona. Later interpretations of phrases by Mrs. Lalita Khambadkone, Mrs. Shuba Fanse and Dr. Pramod Kale were helpful in determining the final wording. The Badve were the priests at Pandharpur who cared for the image of Vithal. "Lord of the wheel" is a synonym for Kirshna.

Bombay:

lOlrhis is an obscure reference, not to the Nila of the Ramayana but probably to some Puranic story.

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given me this birth if you had to give me birth at all? erred in giving me this birth; you have been unkind."

102

You have In some

abhangas. Cokhamela scorns the concepts of purity and pollution: "In the company of the low minded, God is polluted; you are trying , to purify the God with water.

He is not at all impure.

The impurity

10*3 is because you look with impure eyes." "The five elements are the only impurity; there is only one substance in the world. purity or impurity? creation. found.

What is

The origin of pollution is also the origin of

In the beginning and in the end, only pollution is to be

No one knows anyone who is b o m pure.

Cokha says, in wonder,

who is pure?"^1 ^ Other poet-saints, especially Namdev, a tailor, and those of his household, sing of Cokhamela.

Janabai speaks of Cokhamela:

"Chokha though a nameless outcaste stood a king among the saintly."-^5 Namdev, whose simple, passionate songs are perhaps second only to Tukaram’s in popularity, seems to have been very close to Cokhamela, and is said to have brought Cokha's body after death to Pandharpur and buried it against the great door of the temple.

Cokhamela died

doing the Mahar work of mending the village wall, but as Namdev tells ^2Cokhamela, Abhagga 6. ^ ^CokhSmeja, Abhapga 10. 10U

CokhamelS, Abhanga 11. Of the 211 abhangas in this collection, thirty-one refer to untouchability, caste, impurity or ill-treatment, or use some image such as begged food which is directly related to Mahar customs. The vast majority are concerned only with devotion. ^^Robertson, The Mahar Folk, p. 82.

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this story in one of his poems, he praises his friend as if he were his superior: My My My Is

very life is Chokhoba. being's root is he. stock and moral code and God Chokhoba to me.-*-®° These songs and legends are part of the religious tradition

of all castes, and most of the abhapgas and stories quoted above would be known to any Maharashtrian.

The Mahar, as an Untouchable,

was integrated into Maharashtrian life.

His social position was

fixed, but in the bhakti cult he could attain spiritvial freedom. Other bhakti legends illustrate these two points:

the first

that the Mahar had a place, although that place was low in the scale of social values, in Maharashtrian life; the second that true devotion rose above caste. is well known.

The legend of Eknath and the Mahars

The following version is taken from a child's

second standard Marathi reader:

Eknath, a revered poet-saint,

held a feast at his home for his fellow Brahmans, but when hungry Mahars came to his door before the guests arrived, he served the banquet to them, saying "It is true religion to feed the hungry." The Brahmans were angry at his action, and refused to come to the house of Eknath for a second feast.

Eknath then prayed to God.

Coming away from the God's house he set places and called to his ancestors in heaven to come to the feast. heaven came and ate. lO^Robertson,

The Brahmans from

The Brahmans who had scomed Eknath saw The

Mahar

Folk,

p. 83.

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them and were ashamed, and came to ask Eknath's pardon.•" ' The total effect of the bhakti religious movement centered around Pandharpur is still debated.

No one doubts the value of

its literature or its spiritual emphasis, but its effect on the social system is a matter of controversy.

M. G. Ranade, judge and

reformer, held "It modified the strictness ofthe old spirit of caste exclusiveness.

It raised the Shudra classes to a position

of spiritual power and social importance almost equal to that of the Brahmans."^0® Other historical opinion, probably sounder than Ranade's, holds that the bhakti movement, in stressing individual piety, hardened social structure.

Since the goal was devotion and

any man could reach it, there was no motive for social change, and no pressure to alleviate social

i n j u s t i c e .

-^9 gut

movement did not produce social reform in the days

if

bhe bhakti

of the saint-

poets, it has served for modern reformers as traditional undergirding 10fY. K. Pathak, Sapt KathS [Stories of the Saints] (Poona: V. B. Karnik for Maharashtra Pradeshik Lokashikshan Samiti, n.d.). The word Harijan replaces Mahar in this modern child's version of the old story. The booklet also contains stories of Cokhamela and Jotirao Phule, the 19th century Mali reformer. ■^^Mahadeo Govind Ranade, Rise of the Maratha Power (Delhi: The Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 1961) p. 76. 10^Another edition of Ranade's essay contains an introduction which refutes Ranade's view: "it must further be emphasized, as Prof. G. B. Sardar has done, that while the saints in Maharashtra released the people from the thraldom of rituals they did not raise a revolt against Chaturvarna and the Caste system. Their revolt was more or less of a conceptual character, severly confined to the field of religious thinking." R. V. Oturkar, in the introduction to Rise of the Maratha Power and Other Essays by M. G. Ranade and Gleanings from Maratha Chronicles by K. T. Telang (Bombay: University of Bombay, i960), pp. vi-vii. Ranade's essay was first published in 1900.

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for new western standards of equality and justice.

C. B. Agarwal,

author of a moderate defense of the Untouchables' struggle for higher status, Harijans in Rebellion, wrote: An impartial and unprejudiced study of the Shastric texts would reveal that there is ample sanction for untouchability therein. (Dr. Moonje and Mahatma Gandhi to the contrary)...We stand not on the Shastras but on the principles of equality and humanity...One of the greatest reformers in Maharashtra was Dyaneshwar [Jnanadev]. According to the Shastras the Harijans were debarred from hearing or reading the sacred Vedas...Dyaneswar opened the gates of Vedic spiritualism to the Hindu masses in­ cluding the Harijans. In doing so, he put the Harijans under an eternal obligation...We have only to read the writing of Chokha Mela, the untouchable Saint and follower of Dyaneswar, to get an idea of the tremendous joy he felt...Certainly those persons whom Dyaneswar thought good enough to share our spiritual heritage cannot be unworthy of our touch. Dr. R. G. Bhandarkar, who together with Ranade, Gokhale and Agarkar, formed the liberal Brahman attitude toward social reform, shows the influence contact with a wSrkarT Mahar had on him.

In

his Presidential Address to the ninth Indian Social Conference, held in 1895, he said: The Mahars and Mangs on this side of the country and the pariahs on the other, who form the lowest classes, have been entirely neglected. They are the outcasts of Hindu Society, and have been from the remotest times in a very degraded condition. The reference made to this fact by a Mahar Haridasa in his prefactory remarks, while performing a kirtana at my house a few years ago, was very touching. He said, 'The Vedas and Sastras have cast us aside, but the Santas or saints of the middle ages have had compassion on us1 ...and I believe from the opportunities I have had of observation, that the despised Mahar possesses a good deal of natural intelligence and is capable of being highly educated. So that to continue to keep him in ignorance is to deprive the country of an appreciable amount of intellectual resources. 110Agarwal, Harijans in Rebellion, pp. 62-61+. H^-R. G. Bhandarkar, Collected Works, Vol. II.Edited by Harayan Bapuji Utgikar (Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Government Oriental Series, 1928), p. 1+91*

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The effect of the bhakti movement on the Mahars themselves is more difficult to assess.

Seme became warkari —

followers of

the Vithoba cult — which involved the disciplines of abstaining from meat, wearing tulsi beads, making the twice-yearly journeys to Alandi and Pandharpur.

But the Untouchable warkaris undoubtedly

went to Pandharpur in their own caste groups, as pilgrims still do. And once in Pandharpur they could approach no nearer the image than the samadhT of Cokhamela at the foot of the main temple gate.

Aside from the wgrkaris, the use of the name, Cokhamela,

as a caste name112 indicates that in identifying themselves with the great saint, the Mahars felt they had raised their social position.

In later days, Mahars who had reached a certain standard

of economic security and religious sophistication conceived of a temple of Cokhamela as a mark of their religious worth, but the building of temples stopped with the conversion to Buddhism. The fact that the Mahars had a saint from among their own numbers who was honored by all, however, continues to give some a pride in their past.

Full acceptance of the bhakti heritage, however, would

have involved acceptance of the karma-dharma theory of re-birth 1 -i p

Ambedkar wrote, "People have no mind to go into the indi­ vidual merits of each Untouchable no matter how meritorious he is. All Untouchables realize this. There is a general attempt to call themselves by some name other than the ’Untouchables'. The Chamars call themselves Raidas or Jatavas. The Dorns call themselves Shilpakars. The Pariahs call themselves Adi-Dravidas. The Mahars call themselves Chokhamela or Somavanshi and the Bhangis call themselves Balmikis. All of them if away from their localities would call themselves Christians." From an unpublished manuscript, "Untouchables and Change of Religion." Several of the Gazetteers report that Mahars, especially in the Desh, called themselves "Cokhamela."

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according to merit.

Some Mahars in the 20th century, devoted

warkari8, philosophically waited for a new birth to secure a new status.

IIS

The mood of most Mahar leaders, however, even before

the time of Ambedkar, was to accept Cokhamela's greatness without commitment to Cokha’s belief in karma. For Ambedkar, however, the philosophical implications and the historical facts of the bhakti movement, combined with the fact that if he went to Pandharpur, he could not enter the temple, meant that he put aside the possibility of invoking Cokhamela's name in the cause of progress. Pre-Ambedkar Leadership - Bansode and Kamble The weaving of these facts and legends of Mahar history into support for a modern movement and the methods of that movement in the first quarter of the 19th century is best shown by the lives of two leaders, Shivram Janba Kamble of Poona and Kisan Fagoji Bansode of Nagpur.

While the Mahars have been unusually conscientious in their

preservation of documents, the richest sources centered around their leaders.

While Kamble and Bansode are not typical Mahars of their

period, their acknowledged leadership spoke for the highest ambitions of the Mahars in two major areas of Maharashtra. The petition for reinstated army service attempted in 189^ came into actuality sixteen years later, through the offices of a 113S. V. Ketkar, in The History of Caste in India Vol. I (Ithaca, N. Y.: Taylor & Carpenter, 1909), p« 115* tells of meeting a Mahar warkari who cheerfully observed all caste restrictions, confident that he would be born a Brahman in his next life. Ketkar adds that the Americans "would be better off if they had taught karmadharma to the Negro instead of Christianity, a comment that I read as sarcasm.

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Poona Mahar.

By 1910 there was a spokesman, Shivram Janba Kamble,

who in contrast to Walangkar was literate in English.

There was also

more willingness in the caste itself to attempt an appeal to the British Government. earlier plea.

The petition was more sophisticated than the

The group sending it did not use "Non-Aryan" in its

title, but rather called themselves simply "The Conference of the Deccan Mahars." Subhedar Bahadur Gangaram Krishnajee was President and Shivram Janba Kamble, a butler in the Masonic Hall of Poona, was Secretary.

The petition asked for employment "in the lowest

grades of the Public Service, in the ranks of Police Sepoys and of Soldiers in the Indian Army."^*

Its appeal for consideration was

not on the basis of the Mahars' having been demoted from Kshatriya hood, but on the grounds of former service, English justice and humsn worth.

"Our people have been employed in the Indian Army from the

very commencement of the British Raj in our country, and they have risen to the highest positions by their valour and good conduct." Several strong pleas on the grounds of British morality were made, including this one: And it is most encouraging to know that the Honourable House of Commons, as constituted in these times, is composed, to some extent, of the representatives of the lower strata of English society, the workingmen, who, only a quarter of a century ago, were regarded as but Mahars and Paryas by the more educated and affluent classes of their nation. If the Brahmanical castes and 1 The petition is reproduced in The Life of Shivram Janba Kamble, by H. N. Navalkar (Poona: S. J. Kamble, 1930)," p p T 11+2-157. The petition is in English, the biography in Marathi. This part of the appeal repeats the same request found in Walangkar!s earlier petition.

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-Ti­ the Muhammedans have been given the full rights of British citizenship, we must be given the sameV*^ The petition held up to the British "the noble part which Japan has played in the elevation of its outcastes."

The fact

that Mahars as Christian converts had attained distinguished positions was followed by "The British Government could not mean that we should change our religion that we might enjoy our just and lawful rights as British subjects." There seems to be no record of British response to the petition, but it circulated widely in India among Untouchables and reform groups.

The pressures of war rather than the persuasion of the

Mahars were probably responsible for the Mahars being admitted into labour units during the First World War.

Toward the end of

the war they formed two small companies attached to the infantry and later the 111th Mahar battalion which was disbanded at the end of the war without having seen action. Kamble, the acknowledged leader of the Mahars in Poona for the first third of this century, was active in other efforts to improve /•

the lot of the Mahars.

He began a Marathi newspaper, Somwanshlya Mitra

(Friend of the Soawanshiya, which represents both a sub-caste among the Mahars and "the race of the moon," a major mythological division of Hindus) in Poona in 1909

was active in the "anna fund" -night school

run by literate Mahars for the less well educated; and was a leader in the Parvati temple satyagraha conducted by Untouchables and a few caste •^Navalkar, Life of Shivram Janba Kamble, p. lUU. ^A'iavalkar, p. 33-

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Hindus in 1929-

Kamble also addressed a number of letters and

petitions to government officials and the newspapers from 190^ to 1930, attempting to bring Mahar grievances and Mahar rights to public attention. As Ambedkar began to come on the public scene in the 1920’s, Shivram Janba Kamble welcomed him as the educated leader he himself could not claim to be.

In 1926, as President of the Public Meeting

of the Somvanshiya Anna Fund Society, he suggested that B. R. Ambedkar and Subhedar R.S. Ghatge be nominated as depressed class representatives to the Bombay Legislative Council. 117

The following

year, both were present at a meeting held at the foot of the Koregaon army memorial pillar, and a photograph shows a garlanded, western-dressed Ambedkar among a group of traditionally dressed men.

Both were present that year at a farewell meeting for Dr.

Harold H. Mann, retiring Director of Agriculture in Bombay Presidency, who had been consistently sympathetic with Depressed Class activities in P o o n a . I n 1930 Kamble agreed with the All India Depressed Class Congress at Nagpur that Ambedkar ought to represent them at the Round Table Conference.

A break with Ambedkar, probably over the 1937

“■^Navalkar, p. 171. ^-®At the meeting, Harold Mann was thanked for his "yeoman service" for the uplift of the Mahars, beginning with help to a student given in 1908 and continuing through the establishment of the Government Hostel for the Depressed Classes in Poona in 1922. The address "humbly requested” Dr. Mann to look after Depressed Class interests and rights through some of his friends in Parliament. Harold Mann's correspondence with Shivram Janba Kamble continued after his return to England. The address is quoted in Navalkar's life of Kamble, pp. 112-113, in English. "^Navalkar, Life of Shivram Janba Kamble, p. 175*

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election nominations, took Kamble out of what was by then Ambedkar's movement. Kamble's methods - conferences, petitions, organization for action, attempts to enter government on the basis of democratic rights - are similar to Ambedkar's.

His leadership, however, was

more a product of his contact with the English, however, than of his Mahar associations or his connections with caste Hindu reformers. In spite of the Parvati Satyagraha effort, a commitment to securing rights within Hinduism, he was in some ways less in tune with the contemporary Indian spirit than Ambedkar.

In 1930, when Ambedkar

stated that independence for India was necessary and good, provided Untouchables had their rights within the new nation, Kamble formed an "Indian National Anti-Revolutionary Party" to work against Gandhi's civil disobedience movement and to support British rule until "the complete removal of untouchability and the overthrow of the school of 'Chaturvarna' [the classic four fold division of caste]" had been achieved.

120

The Party barely survived its initial

announcement, but Kamble's work among Poona Mahars formed a base for Ambedkar's later political efforts. The life of a Mahar reformer from the Vidarbha area illustrates the direction the Mahar movement was taking in that area before Ambed­ kar's rise to leadership.

Kisan Fagoji Bansode (1879-19^6) was born

in Mopla, a town 2k miles from Nagpur.

His family evidently had a

small shop of some sort, a reflection of greater social freedom in •^^Extract from the Bombay Chronicle, April 2, 1930, reprinted on the cover of H. N« Navalkar, The Life of Shivram Janba Kamble.

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-TUVidarbha, where Mahars not infrequently were weavers, peddlers and shopkeepers.

He began school by sitting outside on the veranda, ^

but his teacher, a Sonar (goldsmith) and a follower of Gopal Ganesh Agarkar, brought him inside, and he became the first Untouchable to sit with the other schoolchildren.

121

The town

of Mopla evidently was affected by the social reform movement of the 1900's.

A Sudharak Mandal (Reform Society) invited a

Brahman to read Puranas in Kisan Fago's house in 1908, and although the townspeople had thoughts of boycott, the Brahman status of the reformer prevented drastic action, and the trouble subsided.

A

little later Kisan Fago started a press, and this enabled him to make a living as well as print various newspapers, brochures, and books related to the ^reform of untouchability. He also started a library in Mopla, receiving thirty trunks of books from caste Hindus interested in his efforts. Bansode's connections with caste Hindus were strong.

He

and G. A. Gawai, a Mahar of Amraoti, went to western Maharashtra to join the Prarthana Ssmaj in 1910.

122

Bansode's biography of

121rphis reference to the influence of Agarkar is one of many I have found in various parts of Maharashtra. Information on the life of Bansode has been gathered from his son, Shamrao Bansode of Nagpur, and from others interviewed in Nagpur and the town of Mopla. ■^^Na. Ra. Shenae, G_. A. Gawai: Vyakti agl KSrya (Life and Work) (Amraoti: Prabhakar Pandurang Ehatkar,19^3*7, p. 25. Gawai was a more highly educated man than Bansode and often was the one chosen to testify to government commissions, but he does not seem to have had the personal following of either Bansode or Kamble. He still lives in Amraoti, where he is associated with a hostel he began for the Depressed Classes, but he is not a leader in the current Mahar political movement.

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Cokhamela,

published by his own press in 1941,

is dedicated to

Vithal Ramji Shinde, the chief Prarthana Samaj educator working among the Untouchables.

Bansode also had contacts with Hindu Mahasabha

members, and although he opposed some of the Mahasabha's theories of caste, he seems to have been in close touch with their chief spokesman, Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya.

Bansode preached against conversion to

Christianity, trying instead to create both practical changes and theoretical declarations that would make the Untouchables' place within Hinduism of a higher order.

It is said that he tried to get

the Mahasabha to resolve that all varpas were equal.

123

Bansode's activities touched Mahar life in many areas.

He was

a labor leader in the Empress Mills in Nagpur, where a large percentage of the workers were Untouchables, and published Mazdur PatrikS (Workers' Newspaper) from 1918 - 1922 to educate mill labor.

He not

only held conferences for Untouchables, but went from house to house in Maha.rw&das, "preaching self respect among people who felt they were being punished for previous sin."^^

He also preached Mahar pride on

the basis that they were former rulers of the land.

He founded a

school for girls in 1907; bis wife taught Untouchable women to ride bicycles and attempted to create bangle sellers from among ^^The connection between the Untouchables' movement and the Hindu Mahasabha is an interesting one. Many Mahasabha members, including Vinayak Damodarpant Savarkar, were more liberal on matters of caste than non-Mahasabha orthodox Hindus, and a number engaged in reform work. The basis for their work was probably an attempt to prevent further conversions to Islam "and Christianity. -'-^Quotation from S. V. Dahat of Nagpur, formerly of Bhandara district, an extremely able informant on the movement of the 1920's and 1930's.

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them so that they would not have to come in close contact with the Muslim bangle sellers then pursuing the trade.

He created an

anna fund to encourage Mahars to go into hotels and order tea.

He

made a number of trips to Pandharpur, trying to collect the abhaggas of Cokhamela, which were then unpublished, and used this religious heritage, as well as songs of his own, to preach a higher religion to the Untouchables. The aims of the various societies formed by Bansode, and the resolutions of the conferences over which he presided, provide insight into his own program for uplift and into the condition of the Mahar at that time.

The Sanmarg Bodhak Nirashrit Samaj (Depressed

Class Society showing the right path) founded October 1, 1903, in Mopla, had as its program the removal of ignorance, "whereupon untouchability would also be removed."

It urged Mahars, Mangs and

Chambhars "not to become Christian and to obstruct conversion; not to eat what is not to be eaten, not to drink what is not to be drunk; to spread education; to acquire citizenship; to uplift their economic condition; to organize; and to create among caste Hindus,, a feeling that the downtrodden should be raised up."

Ganesh Akaji Gawai, an

Amraoti Mahar educated up to matriculation, was president of this Conference; Bansode the organizer.

'

^"^A copy of the program of the Samaj is in the possession of Bansode's son, Shamrao Bansode. A hasty translation of it was made with the help of M. R. Panchbhai of Nagpur while we were at the Bansode home. A short life of Bansode by N. R. Shende contained in PradTp, a collection of Bansode's poetry (Nagpur: Shamrao Bansode, 1958), mentions the Samaj as an organization through which Bansode "for twenty years awakened the people of Maharashtra." p. 13.

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A message to Untouchables from the Antyaja Samaj (Last-born, or Untouchable, Society) of Mopla in 1919 stresses some of these same admonitions, but lays even more emphasis on internal reform: "Even all Mahars do not dine together.

The distinction between

Ladwan and Bawni (sub-caste among the Mahars) should be done away with.

There should be religious processions.

meat, drink, or sell cows to butchers. of other religions. our children.

We should not eat

We should not read books

We should appoint a Hindu teacher and educate

We should not raise pigs — caste Hindus hold us

untouchable because of this.

Our women should not go to tamashas.

We should take part in religious observances."^^ The Mahera Sabha Badnur (Mahar Conference at Badnur) passed the following resolutions under the presidency of Kisan Fagoji Bansode in June, 1921+, about the time Ambedkar was organizing his first association in Bombay: carcasses.

"We will not eat cows nor drag out

A fifty rupee fine will be imposed for selling a live

cow to a butcher.

If the husband is alive, a wife may not have

another husband without divorce. horse, nor touch cow dung.

A man should not brush another's

We should not feel any sense of

untouchability after throwing out the carcas of a dog or cat but take a bath afterwards. corpse.

We should not accept the clothes of a

Dowry should be fixed at 16 - 20 rupees.

use bad words in marriage ceremonies. woven cloth.]

We should not

We should use khadi [hand-

We should educate our children.

We should stop

i

A copy of the Antyaja Samaj's message is in the possession of Shamrao Bansode.

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begar [forced labor.]

The Kotval [a village servant with police

duties] should get ten rupees per month.

One man from the Depressed

Classes should be taken on the Board of Assessment and other municipal groups.

"

The resolutions of these conferences show

an attempt to do away with practices unacceptable to the value system of high caste Hindus; to challenge prohibitions on Mahar social freedom and obligations, such as begar, which were required chiefly of Untouchables; to raise Mahar village servants' wages; to enter representative governmental bodies; to work with caste Hindus in securing sanction for more equal treatment.

Almost

equal parts of sanskritization and modernization are involved. Bansode's popular title was Guruvarya, (the best of gurus). A collection of his own poetry was published after his d.eath by his son.

Its cover contains a number of sketches which effectively

convey his message:

sketches of Mahatma Fhule and Dr. Ambedkar,

representing the caste Hindu reformer and the educated Untouchable leader; line drawings of an Untouchable, squatting, receiving water from a caste Hindu because he is forbidden to touch the well, and another figure being turned away from the temple, illustrating the wrongs Untouchables must not tolerate; and the figures of a woman learning to read, a man reading a newspaper, and children going to school, symbolizing the new generation and its ambition.

A poem

from this collection represents Bansode's religious message: ■^The resolutions of the Mahera Sabha, in Hindi, are in the possession of Shamrao Bansode.

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Why do you endure curses? Cokha went into the temple resolutely. Why do you, ashamed, stay far off?

You are the descendants of Cokha. Why do you fear to enter the temple? Brace yourself like a wrestler, c o m . Together let us conquer pollution.Bansode had a fairly close relationship with Ambedkar up until the conversion announcement of 1935, which he opposed.

They

may have met earlier, but it is certain that Kisan Fago brought Ambedkar to Nagpur about 1926 and introduced him in Indora, an area with a large Mahar population near the Empress Mills, as the leader of the Mahars.

However, an issue of Cokhamela, one of

Bansode's newspapers, of February 27, 1936, devotes much of its space to criticism of Ambedkar's intent to convert.

Bansode was a

respected leader of the Mahars in Nagpur, but the message of Ambedkar was stronger and Nagpur became, then and later, one of the strongholds of the conversion movement. Much of Bansode's message of reform is similar to Ambedkar's, although addressed to Vidharba conditions.

His work differs in

that he was entirely committed to Hinduism, and worked closely with caste Hindus to try to secure commitments of help for the Mahars. The anti-Christian, anti-Muslim note in his preaching is quite strong, at least as far as conversion is concerned. and Kamble had considerable organizing ability.

Both Bansode

Neither had the

-*-^®Kisan Phaguji Banso^., Pradlp, p. ^8. Translated from the Marathi with the help of Lalita Khambadkcne.

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education which would enable them to conceive of a way to secure political rights, although both saw that representation on public bodies was necessary to secure better conditions.

By the mid-'30's,

when Ambedkar's political movement was fully launched, both were, by ♦

Indian standards, old men, their work forming the foundation for Ambedkar's movement but superseded by his more effective approach.

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chapter

II

DR. AMBEDKAR ADD THE MAHAR MOVEMENT, 1917 - 1935 Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar first appeared as a public spokesman for the Untouchables in 1919Committee

His testimony before the Franchise

in that year illustrates both the abilities which were to

make him the virtually unquestioned leader of the Mahar movement and the changing political atmosphere in India which allowed an Untouchable leader to rise to prominence.

Ambedkar’s testimony will be reviewed

in the following chapter, which traces the Mahar political movement vis-a-vis the British reforms from 1917 until the Government of India Act of 1935*

Internal caste change and the rise of Ambedkar as a caste

leader must first be examined.

However, the nature of Ambedkar’s first

appearance is of importance for an understanding of his later power. It was his ability to deeil with the new opportunities for public protest given Untouchables by the reforms which made it possible for him to overshadow the leadership of men like" Kisan Fago Bansode and Shivram Janba Kamble, carrying the caste’s unity and ambition to higher levels. Three aspects of the 1919 testimony, aside from its content, indicate the personal qualities of Dr. Ambedkar which entered into his rise to a unique place of leadership.

First, Ambedkar spoke for no

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group.

While G. A. Gawai testified in the Central. Provinces on behalf

of the Depressed India Association, a group which relied at least in its early days on Non-Brahman and English direction, Ambedkar was called in as the only college graduate among Bombay Province Untouchables, and spoke without organizational affiliation.

He was entirely his own man.

While he later created organizations which offered proof of mass support, he was never a&sociated with a group which he did not dominate.

This

quality of independence gave Ambedkar an aura of strength and dominance and a reputation for representing Untouchables single-mindediy, without subtle pressures from collaborators. Secondly, Ambedkar's testimony to the Franchise Commission was lengthy, sophisticated in attitude and language, occasionally harsh in judgment of high caste Hindus but never beyond the bounds of a lawyer's impassioned plea.

He was as articulate, as poised as any member of '

India's traditional elite.

While he was thoroughly identified with the

Untouchables, he was also the embodiment of their growing ambition to compete successfully in the world of the elite. In addition, Ambedkar's 1919 testimony went beyond the presenta­ tion of Untouchables' grievances and pleas for Untouchable represen­ tation to discuss the basis of democratic government and the franchise arrangements for the entire Province.

His testimony was founded on a

belief that representative government would rectify social injustice. While Untouchables in Madras, following the lead of the Non-Brahmans, refused to appear before the Franchise Committee

because of the ob­

jectionable statements of some of the Committee

Brahman members,

Ambedkar confidently used this public platform to express his faith in

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popular government as well as to make known the needs of Untouchables. Ambedkar's belief in the efficacy of political reform lent optimism to to the Mahar movement.

Confidence in the securing of social goals

through political means acted as a spur to caste unity. It was this independent, articulate, confident figure which was able to dominate all the aspects of the emerging Mahar movement.

The

forces released within the Mahar caste by changes in traditional village structure combined with reforming factors in Maharashtrian life to produce a man who personified the new Mahar aspirations. Ambedkar: Background for Leadership While Ambedkar was by birth a member of the Mahar Untouchable community, his family had already risen above traditional Mahar village service by the route of the British army.1 His grandfather, Malojirav Sakpsl, from the village of Ambadave in Ratnagiri District, had enlisted in the British army, as did his three sons.

The youngest son, Ambedkar's

father, Ramji Sakpal, joined the 106th Sappers and Miners at the age of 18.

He then married Bhimabai Murbadkar, the daughter of a Subhedar

Major, which was the highest non-commissioned rank an Indian could hold in the army.

Descended on both sides for several generations from army

people, Ambedkar was born in 1891 in Mahu (or Mhow, now in Madhya Pradesh,) where his father was serving as headmaster of an army normal school.

His grandfather and father were literate, as were the women in

^ y basic source for the facts of Ambedkar's early life is^the multivolume biography in Marathi, Da. Bhlmrao Ramji Ambedkar, by Ca. Bh. Khairmode, chiefly Volume I. (Bombay: Sri Yeshwantrao Bhimrao Ambedkar, 1952.)

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the family as well, and there was no question but that Bhimrao, the fourteenth child, would be educated.^ Retired from the army shortly after Bhimrao's birth, Ramji Sakpal went to live in a community of Mahar army pensioners at Dapoli, in Ratnagiri District.

The young

Bhimrao began his education there, and continued it at Satara, where his father had secured employment as a store keeper with the army. Here the family also lived with a group of army pensioners, chiefly from the Konkan or Ratnagiri region, and Ambedkar attended a Camp school.

A Brahman teacher at this school gave Ambedkar the name he

was to use the rest of his life.

The traditional family name, Scucpal

(which is a totem name,) or a name derived from his ancestral village, Ambadavekar, might well have been used according to the pattern de­ veloped as Maharashtrians entered a world where last names were required.

But the teacher, who evidently loved the young Ambedkar,

although he did not touch him, gave the boy his own name, Ambedkar, and entered it in the school lists.

■3

In 1900, Ambedkar entered the English School at Satara, sitting apart from the rest of the class.

The family moved to Bombay in 190U,

chiefly so the children could be well educated, and Bhimrao Ambedkar /*

^Ambedkar, in an interview in 19^7 with Satyabodh Hudlikar (Havayug, A.pril 13, 19^+7, quoted in Khairmogie, Vol. I. p. 28) stated that all the women and children in his family could read. Khairmode claims that army children received compulsory education so that boys and girls reared in army families were literate. Khairmocje, Vol. I; pp. 12 - 13. ^Khairmode, Vol. I; pp. 37 - 39* the Brahman teacher and the giving of the article of April 13, 19^7. He added that an affectionate letter at the time of the KhairmogLe, Vol. I; p. h2.

Ambedkar told the story of name first in the Navayug the schoolteacher wrote him Round Table Conference.

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matriculated in 1907.

Ambedkar was probably the second Mahar to pass

the Bombay University matriculation, although some army Mahars, among them his father, had had equvalent education in army schools.

The

community in which the family lived, Dabak chawl, held a celebration early in 1908 to mark the achievement.

Among the caste Hindus who

attended were S. K. Bole, who later introduced a bill in the provincial legislative assembly to open all government supported public places to Untouchables, and a teacher, K. A. Keluskar.

Keluskar presented the

young Ambedkar with a copy of his new book, a life of the Buddha, a gift that has now entered the folklore of the Mahar caste as a prophecy.14 Shortly before his matriculation, Ambedkar- was married to Ramabai Walangkar, a girl of nine or ten from a Konkani Mahar

family.^

Her father was a laborer, but family connections included army men. The early Mahar leader Gopal Baba Walangkar was a relation of Ambedkar's young bride.

In spite of the family background, Ramabai Ambedkar shared

none of Ambedkar's drive for education or higher status.

Aside from

bearing Ambedkar four children, of whom only one survived, she remains a shadowy figure in the background of his increasingly unusual career. 4Keer, Dhananjay, Dr. Ambedkar, Life and Mission (Bombay: Popular Prakashan, 2nd ed ., 1962), p. 19. An article by K. A. Keluskar in JanatS Khas Ajjk, 1933 (The People; special issue) (Marathi), pp. 1-5 describes Keluskar's conversation with Bhimrao's father at the celebration and relates how he (Keluskar) subsequently took Bhimrao to the Gaikwad of Baroda to secure the Gaikwad's help in the boy's further education= No mention of the gift of a life of Buddha is made. ^The low marriage ages for Ambedkar and his bride, 1^ and 9 or 10, indicates a Sanskritizing change from his father's and mother’s ages at marriage, 19 and 13.

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Encouraged by his father and several caste Hindu teachers, and vith the help of a twenty-five rupee a month stipend from the Gaikwad of Baroda, Ambedkar attended Elphinstone College.

He passed his B.A.

exam in English and Persian, his caste precluding a choice of Sanskrit studies.^

After graduation, Ambedkar went to Baroda to serve the

Maharajah in payment for his educational stipend.

Pine days later he

returned to Bombay to see his ailing father just before he died.

Dis­

satisfied with the treatment he had received in the Baroda government office and with his living quarters (he had stayed in the office of the Arya Samaj because he could not find a suitable place to live), Ambedkar met the Gaikwad in Bombay and asked for help vith further education.

Baroda had visited America and had sent his own son to

Harvard; he was amenable to postponing Ambedkar's service in Baroda O and to providing graduate study for him at Columbia. The Huzur Order reads: "Mr. B. R. Ambedkar, a Mahar student studying in the Elphinstone College in the Junior B.A. class, should be awarded one of the scholarships for Mahar students. If none is available a new one of a reasonable amount should be created and given to Mr. Ambedkar. Usual conditions as to service etc. should be put in the agreement to be entered into with Government by Mr. Ambedkar." "^Twenty years earlier, even a man of a high Non-Brahman caste, M. R. Jayakar of the Pathare Prabhu community, was refused the study of Sanskrit at Elphinstone High School. Although the intervention of the school principal secured Jayakar's place in the Sanskrit class, Jayakar wrote later that the incident determined his attitude of support toward lower caste uplift. Jayakar, Story of My Life, Vol. I (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1958), p. 13. Such prohibitions, however, were soon lifted. The second Mahar college graduate, M. K. Jadhav, took his degree in Sanskrit from New PoonaCollege in 1925- Satis Chandra Chakravarti and Sarojendra Nath Ray, compilers, Brahmo Samaj, the Depressed Classes and Untouchability (Calcutta" Sadharan Brahmo Samaj, 1933), p. 9» ®Khairmode, Vol. I, pp. 62 - 61. A Soviet history of India (V. V. Balabushevich and A. M. Duakov, ed., A Contemporary History of India (Academy of Sciences of the

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The three years Ambedkar spent at Columbia, 1913 - 1916, awakened, in his own words, his potential.

Columbia was in its golden

age, and a list of Ambedkar's professors reads like a catalog of early 20th century American educators.

Later, Ambedkar wrote, "The best

friends I have had in my life were some of my classmates at Columbia and my great professors, John Dewey, James Shotwell, Edwin Seligaan and James Harvey Robinson.Although it was Edwin Seligman,^ Professor of Economics, with whom Ambedkar kept in touch after he left Columbia and to whom he sent students when he taught at Sydenham College in Bombay, John Dewey seems to have had the greatest influence on Ambedkar.

Dewey's pragmatic philosophy, his theories of education and

democracy seem to be reflected in much of Ambedkar's later writing. While direct references to Dewey are rare, his influence seems to have remained with Ambedkar.

In 195*+, Ambedkar wrote to a Mahar student then

in London, asking him to go to the British Museum and copy out Dewey's book on democracy, which was out of print, for use in an essay on U.S.S.R.) (New Delhi: Peoples Publishing House, 196*:) states that Ambedkar was the illegitimate son of the Gaikwad of Baroda. Since the book is inaccurate in most of its facts about Ambedkar, who is written off as "the leader of the rich Bombay Untouchables," it is hardly necessary to give weight to the story. The plane of respectability Ambedkar's family had painstakingly reached would argue against such a liason with the Gaikwad. It is also not necessary to impute a personal interest to explain the Gaikwad's support. A number of promising young men and reformers received financial support outside the state of Baroda, including Jotiba Phule, Vittal Ramji Shinde and Bhaurao Patil. The Gaikwad's role as benefactor in Maharashtrian reform movements and in its intellectual life has not yet been fully described. 9Columbia Alumni News, December 19, 1930 (New York: University), p. 12.

Columbia

There are several letters from B. R. Ambedkar in the Seligman papers at Columbia University Library.

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democracy Ambedkar was preparing. Ambedkar's chief subject at Columbia was Economics, but he took several courses in Sociology, History, Politics and Philosophy and a year-long seminar in Anthropology with Alexander Goldenweiser. The Anthropology seminar resulted in Ambedkar's first publication, "Castes in India, Their Mechanism, Genesis and Developmert," which appeared in The Indian Antiquary for May 1917-

The paper is interesting for two

theses, one that India was culturally homogeneous and the other that the basis of caste was in the endogamy of the Brahmans, which was adopted in turn by Non-Brahman classes.

These ideas are important in

view of Ambedkar's later battle for separate rights for the Untouch­ ables, a struggle based not upon a claim of different race or culture, but upon the removal by special recognition of disabilities incurred by isolation.

In the paper, presented to the seminar in 1916, Ambedkar

wrote, "Ethnically all peoples are heterogenous. culture that is the basis of homogeneity.

It is the unity of

Taking this for granted, I

venture to say that there is no country that can rival the Indian peninsula with respect to the unity of its culture.

It has not only a

geographic unity, but it has over and above all a deeper and much more fundamental unity - an indubitable cultural unity that covers the land ^•Letter from Dr. Ambedkar to V. B. Kadam, August 2 k , 195*+, in the Ambedkar papers now with the Administrator General, Maharashtra state. In his Annihilation of Caste, 3rd edition (Amritsar: Ambedkar School of Thoughts, 19*+5), p. 78, Ambedkar quotes John Dewey, "who was my teacher and to whom I own so much:" "Every society gets encumbered with what is trivial, with dead wood from the past, and with what is positively perverse. As a society becomes more enlightened, it realizes that it is responsible not to conserve and transmit the whole of its existing achievements, but only such as make for a better future society. The speech which appeared later as Annihilation of Caste was written in 1936.

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frcm end to end."

Substantiating his second thesis on the origin of

caste, Ambedkar criticized those theories which emphasized color or occupation and stressed that the genesis of caste was in the Brahman practice of endogamy, which created castes in the other classes through the working of imitation and excommunication.

Ambedkar's theories on

the development of untouchability are found in much later works.

In

this early paper the explanation for caste divisions is centered not on "the conscious command of a Supreme Authority," but on "an unconscious growth in the life of a human society under peculiar circumstances." A method of correction of caste inequality was not attempted in the seminar paper, but the underlying supposition is that by conscious thought the "unconscious growth" would be seen as evil and unnecessary. Ambedkar's M.A. degree from Columbia was conferred in June, 1915; his Ph.D. degree was not given until June, 1927, although he left New York in 1916, a circumstance probably caused by lack of funds to have his thesis published.

The Evolution of Provincial Finance in

British India was published by P. S. King and Co., London, in 1925 and, shortly after, the Ph.D. degree was granted by Columbia University. Through the direct intervention of the Maharaj over the objec­ tion of the Baroda Diwan and Education Office Minister, Ambedkar received funds from the Baroda Education Department for a year of study in London.^2 A letter from Edwin Seligman introduced him to Sidney Webb, among others, as "an excellent student and a nice fellow, moderate, broad and able," and Ambedkar entered the London School of Economics and 12Khairracde, I., pp. 77-78.

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Political S c i e n c e . I n November 1916 he was admitted to Grey's Inn to study for the Bar.

A request for an extension of time for his studies

in England beyond the year granted was refused by Baroda, and Ambedkar returned in the summer of 1917 to Bombay.

He went to Baroda as mili­

tary secretary to fulfill his pledge of a ten year period of service in return for the educational aid, but again found discrimination in the office and trouble with living arrangements. Forced to leave a Parsi Boarding House where he was living under a Parsi name, and failing to get a place in Baroda offered to him by a Brahman, Professor Joshi, but denied by Joshi's orthodox wife, Ambedkar returned to Bombay.^ After a year and a half of tutoring in Parsi families, at­ tempting to run a Stock and Shares advising agency and teaching at Dharwar College, Ambedkar secured a two year appointment as a Professor at Syndenham College of Commerce in Bombay.

An English comment on

Ambedkar's character is found in a letter from Edward Cannan, Professor of Political Economy in the University of London to Percy Anstey at Sydenham College, which contrasts two candidates for the job: men are unusually' good.

"Both

I don't know anything about Ambedkar except

that he came to do a thesis and attacked it and me in a way which showed he had quite extraordinary practical ability...I rather wonder ^Quoted in Khairmode, I, p. 80. Ambedkar met Sidney Webb.

There is no record that

■^Khairmogle, Vol. I, pp. 78-80. The Parsi Boarding House Story was originally told in Blake Clark's article on Ambedkar, "The Victory of an Untouchable" in The Reader's Digest for March 1950. The story concerning Professor Joshi comes from the K. A. Keluskar article in Janata Kh&s Agk, 1933. The origin of the facts for both writers would have been Ambedkar himself. Along with these difficulties, Ambedkar probably had a strong feeling that his work did not lie in Baroda.

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if he is a pure India; his character is rather Scotch-American, though in appearance he is a fat Indian...Ambedkar would do the job well in his own interest, while Joshi would do it for its own sake.

I find it

difficult to decide which of them would be the better teacher.

Ambed­

kar would get up all that was required with ease and put the trusting student safely through his examinations, but I should think Joshi would be much more ' i n s p i r i n g A m b e d k a r was appointed November 10, 1918, and taught until March 1920, earning enough money to go back to London later that year to finish his study for the M.Sc. and D.Sc. at London and to complete his qualifications for the bar. During the three year interval between his first London experi­ ence and his return to finish his degrees, Ambedkar entered into the life of his caste, although he did not begin organizational work until his own education was completed. conferences.

He attended at least two large caste

He began Muknayak (The Leader of the Dumb), the first of

several newspapers in the Marathi language. Franchise Commission.

He testified to the

But his main energies were spent on earning

money to return to England. Another western Indian prince, Shahu Maharaj of Kolhapur, a Maratha by caste and one of the chief leaders of the Non-Brahman move­ ment, gave support toward Ambedkar's further education.^

237-238.

Kolhapur

^Government File, Education Department, No. 65 - 1-1918, pp. Bombay Archives.

-^Khairmode, Vol. I., p. 270. The Maharajah of Kolhapur also aided in founding Ambedkar's first newspaper, Muknayak in 1920. Khairmo^e, Vol. I. p. 260. For a full description of the life of Kolhapur (187^-1922) and his work on behalf of Non-Brahmans, see A. B. Latthe, Memoirs of His Highness Shrl Shahu Chhatrapati Maharaja of Kolhapur (Bombay: Times Press, 192^), Vol. I and II.

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considered Ambedkar a representative of the Non-Brahman cause in England and urged him to speak in this behalf.

But in London, Ambedkar

had little time for anything but finishing hi3 M.Sc. with the thesis "Provincial Decentralisation of Imperial Finance in British India," his D.Sc. with a thesis on "The Problem of the R u p e e , a n d completing his bar examination from Grey's Inn.

Returning to India the second time,

Ambedkar made no attempt to complete his term of services in Baroda's government, but earned his living as a lawyer and a teacher.

He

supplemented his law earnings by posts first at Batliboi's Accountancy Training Institute from 1925 to 1928, and from 1928 until the midthirties at Government Law College, then an evening school with a part-time faculty.

From his return to Bombay in 1923 on, Ambedkar

began in earnest the dual work of reform and organization of the Mahar caste and representation on behalf of the Depressed Classes in general to government. This recital of Ambedkar's educational opportunities and teaching career seems to leave little room for discrimination against him of the grounds of caste.

But although the door to educational

advancement was never closed in his face, there were many reminders of his status and pinpricks of indignity.

Although he attended English

school at Satara, he sat apart from the rest of the class.

The barber

in Satara would not cut his hair; the cartmen would not carry him.

An

incident is told of students' objecting when Ambedkar used the black­ board in a classroom because their tiffins were behind the board, and Ambedkar himself remembered an inability to get water in his school ^Published in 1923 by P. S. King and Co., London.

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days so vividly that he told the story during his conversion speech at Nagpur in 1956.

In college, although he wanted to study Sanskrit, that

was a prohibited language for him and he graduated with Persian as the required language instead.

The years in New York and London offered

him opportunity to associate with Indian students of all castes and classes, but when Lala Lajpat Rai came to New York in 191^ and started the Home Rule League of America, Ambedkar refused to take part because Untouchables "were the slaves of those who looked for release from political slavery."1® The experience in Baroda, where it is said clerks and peons threw files on his desk from a distance, and other officers suggested that he be served in a corner by a Mahammedan servant at the Club, together with the more serious difficulty of not finding a suitable place to live, evidently affected Ambedkar deeply. In telling of his service in Baroda twenty years later, he wept as he spoke of his tears of that time.

Although his caste did not seem to

interfere with his teaching in government or Parsi schools, it did make his attempt to run his own business, the Stocks and Shares Agency, difficult.

His Marathi biographer writes, "At first there was much

business, and then when the news spread that he was a Dhed [a deroga­ tory name for Mahar] the Shetiyas and Bhatiyas [Gujarati business classes] quit coming."^

His law career was also probably somewhat

restricted because of caste, although he did take cases for caste Hindus and other non-Depressed Classes groups. iSKhairmode, Vol. I. p. 71• quotation in Marathi.

His home was among Mahars in

My translation of an indirect

1^Khairmode, Vol. I, p. 93.

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Satara, in Dapoli, and in Bombay, until he defiantly moved in 193^ from a Bombay Improvement Trust Chavl in Parel to the largely Brahman Hindu Colony area of Dadar. Ambedkar was temperamentally unable to disassociate himself from his caste, even when his living quarters and life style were on another plane from that of his caste fellows.

It is probably true that

he could not have disassociated himself from them, even had he desired to.

He could have lived a quiet life as a teacher, but any political

activity would have to have been as an Untouchable leader, given the context of Indian life.

Had he entered Congress or one of the other

movements, his value to that movement would have been the following he commanded, and that following inevitably was from the Depressed Classes. Ambedkar's Methods:

The Conferences

Ambedkar brought to his leadership of the Mahar movement an education unusual even for a Brahman, a belief in the democratic process, an independent, even arrogant temperament, and a commitment to the cause of the people whose disabilities he in some measure shared by virtue of his birth.

In the years before 1936, his methods for the

modernizing of the Untouchables, the complementary side of his work for political, rights, utilized the methods established by earlier leaders: conferences, newspapers, organizations.

He stressed modernization

rather than sanskritization more than did the earlier leaders, but even this strain can be found in the work of Walangkar, Bansode, Kamble and others.

Until the conversion conference and the formation of a politi­

cal party in 1936, his chief work within the Untouchable community was in building caste unity and morale on the foundations of the earlier

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movement. Ambedkar did bring a larger concept of the problem to this work, however.

Although he is known as a Mahar leader, he attempted

to include all Untouchable castes in his movement.

Although he

stressed the social and religious handicaps of Untouchables, he was conscious of the need for economic opportunities not only for the educated few but for the great mass of agricultural and industrial labor.

Although he based his hope for improvement chiefly on changes

in government, he gave almost equal attention during the early years to changes in caste practices and attitudes that would allow Untouch­ ables to enter whatever new opportunities became available to them. His program is best seen by looking at his methods for reaching the illiterate, scattered, often unambitious group he was determined to aid. Of the various methods of education, the conference seemed best suited both for spreading the message of the awakening of the Untouch­ ables and for gathering mass support for public action.

S. Natarajan,

an astute historian of social reform, writes that "in 1930, by a process of repeated conferences the depressed classes were led into the camp of Dr. B. R. A m b e d k a r . T h i s may be something of an exaggeration, but it is clear that thousands of Untouchables saw and heard Ambedkar at perhaps a dozen large and many small conferences held in various areas of Maharashtra. The first conference, held long before Ambedkar's time, seems Natarajan, A Century of Social Reform ill India (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1962 (secor .l ed'.')', P- lVo.

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to have been a Mahar caste conference in 1903 at Saswad, a town twentyfive miles from Poena, with which Shivram Janba Kamble may have been connected.

Further conferences, especially those planned by Ambedkar,

were designed to include all Untouchables.

Although the leadership

and attenders seem to have been overwhelmingly Mahar, these conferences never assumed the exact nature of a caste conference.

The names of the

conferences and the content of conference resolutions were invariably inclusive of as broad a geographic area and as great a number of Untouchable castes as possible. Just before his return to England in 1920, Ambedkar attended two

conferences of Untouchables. The first was held inMangaon in

Kolhapur State, with Ambedkar as

President.The Maharaja

ofKolhapur

came to the conference and told the attenders, "You have found your pi Saviour in Ambedkar." An inter-caste dinner ended the conference, and the Maharaja time.

ate with the conferees, a radical gesture at the

Later in 1920, a conference of Depressed Classes was held at

Nagpur, with the Maharajah of Kolhapur in attendance as President. Ambedkar gave the major speech, and is said to have warned the Depressed Classes that some reformers wanted them to have political representation by nomination, not by election — proof that the caste Hindu could not know the mind of the Untouchable nor lead him.

At the inter-caste

dinner which was part of this conference also, Ambedkar persuaded all Mahar sub-castes, but not all Untouchable castes, to share a common meal.22

Documentation for these conferences is scanty; no contemporary 2-LKeer, Dr_. Ambedkar, p. b2. 22Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. ^3-

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record of the organizers, or the number of attenders, or the resolu­ tions passed exists.

It is possible that they, like several other

conferences during the period just before the reforms, were related to the Non-Brahman movement.

However, Ambedkar's biographer, Dhananjay

Keer, calls the Nagpur Conference "the first All-India Conference convened by Untouchables."^ In 192b , a Provincial Depressed Classes Conference was held at Barshi, in Sholapur District.

It was at this conference that a resolu­

tion to form a central organization for the task of the "amelioration and uplift" of the Depressed Classes was formed.

Shortly after, the

Bahishkrit Hitakarini Sabha (literally, organization for the welfare of the excluded, but called in English, the Depressed Classes Institute) was formed in Bombay, with Ambedkar as Chairman of the Council of Management.

While the Institute was structured to include casteHindus

and Untouchables from all castes and areas in Bombay province in specific terms and to establish various institutions, the process of holding conferences seemed to continue on an unorganized but workable basis of local effort. ■ If the pattern followed today was in evidence then, a loose structure prevailed among Mahars in each living quarter. Meetings were initiated locally, and outside speakers were called in to draw crowds and present a more sophisticated message than local talent was able to do.

Certainly the organization of the Bahihshkrit

Hitakarini Sabha did not touch the Vidarbha area, and yet Ambedkar was called there not infrequently to act as a leader. The Conference Barshi was followed a year later by

one at Nipani,near Belgaum,

^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. b2.

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at

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now in Mysore State.

Another was held at Mahad in Ratnagiri in 1927,

and large groups assembled at Nagpur in 1930 said in Kampti in 1932. Other conferences were undoubtedly held, but Ambedkar's speeches and some conference resolutions are available only for these. 2k Ambedkar’s addresses to these conferences are a mixture of explanation of the political, scene, exhortation to organize and to press for rights, and occasional chastisement for Untouchables con­ tinuing to live in a degraded condition.

In 192k at Barshi, Ambedkar's

address is generally conciliatory and optimistic in tone, and although he dwells on the poverty of India and the unfair treatment of the Un­ touchable, he also proclaims his joy over the coming time of independ­ ence and his faith that unity, moral living, and the vote will improve conditions.2S ' At Nipani the following year, Ambedkar commented at length on the Vaikam satyagraha being undertaken in Travancore by the Iravas and some caste Hindu reformers with the personal support of Mahatma Gandhi for the use of a temple road.

He had noted briefly the year before

that fear of the conversion of the Untouchables to Islam had prompted Brahman support of the satyagraha. His comments in 1925 showed a certain appreciation of Mahatma Gandhi's efforts, but Ambedkar's ^Scattered notes in Keer's biography of Dr. Ambedkar reveal that he went often to meetings in the Desh and Konkan areas. Later,when he travelled with the Starte Committee of 1928 and the Franchise Committee of 1932, informal conferences were held wherever he happened to be. ^There is a hand-written copy of Ambedkar’s lengthy Marathi speech in the Khairmoday collection at the University of Bombay library. A note on it is addressed to S. M. Mate, a Brahman reformer of Poona, asking him to read it.

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criticism that Gandhi did not enforce non-practice of untouchability and his rejection of the scriptures on which the Orthodox based their opposition were forewarnings of a less optimistic and conciliatory attitude in the future: For us, the most important event in the country today is the Satyagraha at Vaikam...Most of you know what sort of debate is going on at Vaikam. The Untouchables of Vaikam insist that they should be allowed to use a road which is used by all the people and by animals as well. We are not much concerned with all the vacillation and compromise this protest has brought about. The fact to remember is this - that even after a whole year of protest, there is no result. It is true, of course, that some political leaders have changed their attitudes regarding the 'satyagraha' for it has been conclusively proved now that the argument of political, before social is a worthless one... Before Mahatma Gandhi, no politician in this country maintained that it is necessary to remove social injustice here in order to do away with tension and conflict, and that every Indian should consider it his sacred duty to do so. According to Mahatma Gandhi, social and political causes are not separate but are one and the same, and therefore he goes around telling people that independence cannot be achieved without Hindu-Muslim unity and the removal of untouchability. However, if one looks more closely one finds that there is a slight disharmony between Mahatma Gandhi and untouchability, just as there is between Kasturba Gandhi and Lakshmi! For he does not insist on the removal of untouchability as much as he insists on the propagation of Khaddar or Hindu-Muslim unity. If he had he would have made the removal of untouchability a precondition for membership of the Congress as he made yarn spinning a precondition of voting in the party. Well, be that as it may, when one is spurned by everyone, even the sympathy shown by Mahatma Gandhi is of no little importance. Ambedkar went on to note that the Orthodox Brahmans at Vaikam had used scripture to justify their position to Gandhi.

"This clearly

indicates that either we should burn all these scriptures to ashes or verify and examine the validity of their rules regarding untouchability ...and if we are unable to prove their falseness or invalidity, we are to suffer untouchability till the end of time!...Truly these scriptures

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are an insult to people.

The government should have confiscated them

long ago."2^ Two years later at a conference at Mahad, the threat of burning the scriptures turned to action, but only after an attempt to claim the right of using a public source of water was frustrated.

The Mahad

conferences of 1927 are cOilSidered by Mahars to be the beginning of their unity and political awakening.

There is enough documentation of

those meetings to give something of the flavor and tactics of the move­ ment and also to illustrate the caste Hindu connection with Untouchable activities in the 1920's. Mahad is a pleasant town in Kolaba district, south of Bombay, known for its copper and brass ware.

It had a population of seven or

eight thousand, of whom less than U00 were Untouchables, a smaller proportion than the provincial average of ten - twelve percent.

At the

edge of the town, surrounded by the homes of high caste Hindus, is Chovdar tank, quite a distance from the homes of the Mahars beyond the town proper, slightly less far from the Chambhar quarters on the other side of Mahad.

The Mahad Municipality, led by its chairman, Surendra-

nath Tipnis, a man of the Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhu (C.K.P.) caste, ?7 had acted upon the Bole resolution of 1923 in the Bombay Legislative Council and declared its public places open to Untouchables, ^Khairmode, Da. Agbedkar, Vol. II (Bombay: Panchayat Samiti, 19587, pp. 117-118.

Bauddhjan

27:..jUch of the information which follows is from an interview in Mahad with Surendranath Tipnis, who is still associated with the educa­ tion work begun by Ambedkar and was responsible for the development of the Dr. Amoedkar College of Arts, Science and Commerce in Mahad. See Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, pp. 68-70, 39-93, 97-108, for a long account of the Mahad satyagrahas.

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a gesture not utilized by Untouchables both out of fear and because of distance.

Tipnis was an acquaintance of Ambedkar and as a follower of

Agarkar was a radical social reformer.

He invited Ambedkar to hold a

meeting of the Depressed Classes at Mahad.

Arrangements at the town

were made by Tipnis, another C.K.P. who worked with Ambedkar, Anantrao Chitre of Bombay, and a Mahar former military man, Subhedar Savadkar of the Mahad area.

A large field on the outskirts of Mahad belonging to a pQ

Muslim was secured as a conference site,

and Savadkar with a fellow

Mahar traveled from village to village in the area for two months before the conference to urge villagers to come.

Contingents undoubtedly came

from Bombay, and a group from Poona was brought by Mon-Brahman sympa­ thizers with the Mahar movement. ^

Dhananjay Keer records that ten

thousand Depressed Class people from almost all the districts of Maharashtra and Gujarat attended the Conference but this is probably an exaggeration.A Bombay newspaper report records 1500 attenders, but whatever the figure, the numbers were large enough to make the pQ Almost all Depressed Class meetings were held in Muslim buildings or on Muslim-owned land, or in open public areas near the Mahar quarters. Occasionally a theater or a hall under Parsi auspices was used. k. m. Jedhe, a well-known Maratha leader in the Non-Brahman party, is said to have brought a group from Poona. In 1926, Ambedkar had successfully defended Jedhe and three others in the "Deshace Dushman" (Enemies of the Country) case. The family of a well-known Brahman, Vishu Kirshna Shastri Chiplunkar, had sued the author, printer, and the contributors of the preface (Jedhe) and foreword of DeshJLce Dushman, a book which criticized the late Chiplunkar as well as a number of other Brahmans. As a result of this suit, there was considerable cooperation between the Poona Non-Brahmans and Ambedkar in the mid 1920’s. ■^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 69writers are even larger.

Other estimates by sympathetic

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conference and the ensuing satyagraha a legend throughout the Mahar community.

The conference began on March 19, 1927, in a pandal named

after the local deity, Veereshwar. The subjects committee, meeting in the evening after Ambedkar's presidential address, decided upon a march to Chowdar Tank the next day to establish the right of Untouchables to take water there.

Mr. Tipnis

states that this was a spontaneous move, not one planned at the outset of the Conference.

Accordingly, a long procession, which included

caste Hindus associated with the conference as well as Untouchables, marched from the field to the tank, and the leaders bent down and drank. Shortly after, a rumor spread through Mahad that the Untouchables were going to enter the Veereshwar Temple, and at that cry, a riot broke out, with caste Hindu "rowdies", according to the newspaper report, attacking any Untouchable in sight.

The Bombay Chronicle credits the

Untouchables with dedication to non-violence, and although twenty were wounded, no full-scale battles ensued. 31

A police investigation was

held and five Hindus were sentenced by the District Magistrate to four months imprisonment, 32 but the Untouchable attenders at the Conference also suffered as caste Hindus in the villages to which they returned meted out punishment. 33

— Support for the satyagraha came from a number

of sources, among them Veer Savarkar, the revolutionary whose interest in the Depressed Classes may have stemmed from his desire for a stronger 3^A clipping from the Bombay Chronicle, undated but circa March, 1927, was inserted as evidence in Ambedkar's statement to the Indian Statutory Commission, Vol. XVI, pp. 37-^7* op

. and the Evening News (Bombay), October 16", 1929. ^N. V. Gadgil gives a description of the Parvati satyagraha in his chapter on Ambedkar in KShi Moti K&hl Mohra [Some Pearls, Some Gems] (Poona: Venus Book Stall, 19^2)~y pp. 20U - 21+3. S. M. Joshi is the veteran Socialist leader.

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women, attempted to climb the long flight of steps leading up the hill to the main temple gate.

They were attacked by defending caste Hindus

and several, including the Chambhar P. iT. Rajbhoj who later worked with Ambedkar, taken to the hospital.

When the British Collector and the

police arrived on the scene, they gave protection to a small group which climbed the steps to the now-closed door.

A party of five sat

before the door day and night, but the temple remained closed for four months and the satyagraha attempt gradually was abandoned. A report of the work done by the Anti-Untouchabiiity Sub­ committee of the Indian National Congress for April - December, 1929, sheds light on the Parvati Satyagraha and on Congress attitudes toward the movement.

The committee, which included Pandit Malaviya and

Jamanlal Bajaj, a Marwari businessman from Wardha who had built a temple for Untouchables in his home district, prefaced its report with notice that about half a dozen temples had been opened to Untouchables, and went on to express disapproval of the method of satyggraha employed in Poona: Sjt. Bhopatkar, President, Poona Asprishyata Nivarak Msndal [the Poona Committee for the Prohibition of Untouchability] issued a closely reasoned appeal addressed to the trustees of the historical. Parvati Temple of Poona exhorting them to open the doors of the famous temple to an Hindus including untouchables. Our appeals were vigorously supported by a number of leading caste Hindus and it seemed for a while to promise rich fruition when suddenly the movement of direct action under the title of 'Temple Entry Satyagraha' was launched by certain leaders of the untouchable community in Poona to force an entry into the Parvati Temple...a sudden self-consciousness has swept over the depressed classes in recent years...tneir leaders... are naturally impatient with the pace of reform...they attacked the caste Hindu leaders and workers, questioned their bonafides and attributed all their effort for the uplift of the untouchable to sheer Jealousy of Mussulmans or Christians. In Bombay they openly talked of equality of status not only in all out-door dealings but in the matter of inter-dining and inter-marriage. They endorsed the action of those who gave up Hindu

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Religion and embraced Islam as -the most effective method of teaching a lesson to the Hindus. The 'Satyagraha' which the Bombay untouchable leaders proposed to resort to was naturally different from the well-known methods of Mahatma Gandhi inasmuch as they did not make too much of a fetish of non-violence. All these upset the Hindu population in Bombay and Poona almost entirely and an atmos­ phere of increasing good-will that had prevailed was completely marred for the time being... Poona Satyagraha was suspended for a fortnight on the leaders of the local Asprishyata Nivarak Mandal and Messrs. Kelkar, Jaykar and Jamnalal BajaJ offering to mediate with the trustees. They... unfortunately failed to persuade the latter under the atmosphere of bitterness and distrust that prevailed. The 'Satyagraha' was thereupon resumed and is still continuing, batches of untouchables, aided by some caste Hindu sympathisers who have cast in their lot with the Satyagrahis from the start, daily visit the Parvati temple and sit waiting at the foot of the stairs leading to the main gate of the temple which is kept closed and bolted since the commence­ ment of the Satyagraha. The Poona Satyagrahis have till now observed exemplary non-violence in spite of provocation and actual violence on one or two occasions on the part of caste Hindu op­ ponents or by the guards especially appointed by the Trustees. The Committee had to work hard during these months of acute tension. The Brahman non-Brahman bitterness already existing in Poona and the Deccan contributed to aggravate the tension. ° A long poem on the Parvati Satyagraha written in the style of the Marathi powada tells the story from the Mahar viewpoint.

l*o

It

begins with the traditional invocation to Ganpati and to the gods of the temples of Parvati, Shiva and Parvati, using their various names: Get up, come on, brothers, let us go to Parvati. Shankar with the banner of truth in our hands.

We shall meet

The innocent Shankar, Sadashiv. awaits his devotees. He treats rich and poor with equality, he does not discriminate. lift

Indian National Congress. Report of the Work Done by the Anti-Untouchability Sub-Committee, April - December, 1929* L. B. Bhopatkar, a Poona Brahman lawyer, is another example of the MahasabhaUntouchable connection. He spoke in favor of the Mahad satyagraha (Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 78) and much later was supported by Ambedkar in the 1937 elections. A story current in Poona, however, is that he had his house purified after Ambedkar visited it. ^ J a m g e k a r

Powada. (Poona:

, Tu^.shiram Lakshman, ParvatTvaril Satyggrahaca Anant Vinayak Patwardhan and T. L. Jamgekar, 1930.)

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Holding to the protection of truth, let us go to Samba. tell the grief of our minds to Mother Parvati.

Let us

With the strength of our determination, we will persuade Ganapati. Sound truth. The powaj-a continues to tell of the Maratha and Brahman sympathizers, the crouds and photographers watching, the attack of the orthodox and the injury of Kajbhoj, the arrival of the collector, and the compromise of some with those who wanted to restrain the movement. It ends with a plea to Lord Shankar not to remain quiet, but to assist his children.

Throughout the poem the name of Ambedkar is invoked,

often together with the names of Shivaji Maharaj and Cokhamela.

After

the description of attempts to bring the satyggraha to a close, the poet warns, "Don't take advice from anyone but Ambedkar Saheb."

The

impression left in the mind of the reader is that the s^t.yngrahis felt the Gods were on their side in their battle for rights, and that Ambedkar had become an Olympian figure, as inspiring, as powerful, almost as remote, as Shivaji and Cokhamela. The Parvati Satyagraha faded out, some of its energy going into a more successful attempt to open tea shops to the Depressed Classes, and the temples were safe from Untouchable worshippers until 19^7-

The

action, the publicity and the unity achieved further strengthened the Mahar movement, although cooperation with other Untouchable castes and caste Hindus was not lasting.

On the other side, of the coin, the

failure of the satyagraha offered proof that religious rights could be won neither by protest nor negotiation, and the disapproval and inter­ ference of Congress leaders was a factor in the growing Mahar distrust of Gandhian and Congress attitudes toward them.

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The largest and last of the temple entry attempts occurred in Nasik, on the Godavari River, one of the holiest pilgrimage cities in Maharashtra.

Although B. K. Gaikvad of Nasik was the chief instigator,

Ambedkar did concern himself directly with this satyagraha, sending directives to Gaikwad, organizing cooperation from Bombay people, and visiting the satyagraha site.

This temple entry attempt, which began

in 1930 and ended only with Ambedkar's decision in 1935 to convert to another religion, was more effectively planned and better sustained than the Parvati Satyagraha, almost entirely led by Mahars, and so timed that it added strength to Ambedkar's claim at the Round Table Conference in London that the Untouchables were a separate entity from caste Hindus and should be so treated. The object of entry in Nasik was the Kalaram temple.

Here,

according to legend, the principal characters of the Ramayana epic, Rama, Lakshmana and Sita, stopped during their exile from the court at Ayodhya, and the site accordingly became an important place of pilgrimage.

Ambedkar participated in the planning of the satyagraha

at Kalaram, but Gaikwad, a Mahar leader of Nasik who had been active in the Mahad satyagraha, was its chief organizer.The satyagraha began on March 4, 1930, after much preliminary propaganda, with 10,000 -^Ambedkar wrote B. K. Gaikwad on February 20, 1930, the month before the Satyagraha began, that he was coming to Nasik to meet the Satyagraha Executive Committee. "Your Satyagraha is a matter of great anxiety to me, particularly because owing to the other pressing engage­ ments, I have not been able to devote myself to it." During the second Round Table Conference, Ambedkar wrote Gaikwad from London: "I feel quite ashamed of myself when I think I am so little helpful in a campaign which if I have not started I have been at least responsible for." September 23, 1931. Letters in the possession of B. K. Gaikwad,

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Untouchables gathered at Nasik. ^

A Brahmati who had participated in

the Parvati satyagraha, N. V. Gadgil, writing sympathetically about the Mahar movement, reports that Ambedkar told the first mass gathering: Your problems will not be solved by temple entry. Politics, economics, education, religion — all are part of the problem. Today's satyagraha is a challenge to the Hindu mind. Are the Hindus ready to consider us men or not; we will discover this today...We know that the god in the temple is of stone. Darsan and puja will not solve our problems. But we will start out, and try to make a change in the minds of the Hindus. ^ A month after the satyagraha began, the annual chariot proces­ sion of the temple took place.

Negotiations had won the right for

Untouchables to participate in pulling the chariot, but when the procession began the Mahars found themselves unable to secure a hold on the ropes.

They protested vigorously, and a riot ensued.

The

temple was closed, and the following five years were marked by mass satySgrahas during the spring festival and smaller groups of satySgrahTs sitting before the temple throughout the year, except in the rainy season.

At least one death, that of a caste Hindu boy, resulted

from intermittant battles. In the fall of 1931, the Commissioner of the Central Division asked Ambedkar to advise the Nasik people to stop the satyagraha, and Ambedkar wrote B. K. Gaikwad: I am going to tell him that we cannot stop. We must not take our orders from the Government just as we must not take them from the Orthodox Hindus. We have trusted the Government long enough to remove untouchability. But it has not lifted its finger to do anything in the matter and it has no right to ask us to stop. We must take the burden on our shoulders and do what we can to free ^ Indian Annual Register, Vol. I, 1930, p. 28. ^Gadgil, Kshi Motl Kahi Mohra, p. 219-

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ourselves at any cost from this curse. If the Government does not [do anything] to help us it must not hamper us. There is no use telling us that we must not create ill feeling between different classes and communities. This appeal by Government should be addressed to all communities and not to us alone. It should especially be addressed to those communities who are in the wrong and who are sinning in the matter. You may publish a translation of this in handbills... 53 In the summer of 1932, the Government entered into the fray again.

The District Magistrate of Nasik prohibited Untouchables from

bathing in the sacred pools of the temple until they obtained an order from a civil court entitling them to bathe there.^

Although the

matter of a civil suit was certainly on Ambedkar's mind as an effort parallel with the ongoing water rights suit in M a h a d , t h e Magis­ trate's order was not turned into a case.

The Nasik sntyggraha was

widely publicized in India and England and offered excellent backing for Ambedkar's claims that Untouchables were separate from Hindus and that Congress basically opposed Untouchables' progress. Although B, G. Kher of Bombay, a prominent Congressman, actually participated in the satyggraha, the President of the District Conference of Congress in Nasik lent credence to Ambedkar's view by siding with the orthodox ^Letter from B. R. Ambedkar in London to B. K. Gaikwad. October lL, 1931. Letter in the possession of B. K. Gaikwad. ^London Times, June 7, 1932. ^^Ambedkar states that a suit is being contemplated in the Appeal on behalf of the Depressed Classes Institute (London: November, 1931), circulated at the time of the Round Table Conference. Ambedkar may have been waiting until the Mahad case was settled to determine his tactics. The Mahad settlement was in Ambedkar's favor, but was not decided until 1937- By this time, the push for temple entry was superceded by the announcement of conversion from Hinduism. See also page 126.

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Hindus on the question of temple entry.^ One interpretation of the satyggraha effort is to assume that it was designed to underwrite the pleas of Ambedkar in London for recognition of the suffering and the rights of the Depressed Classes.5? While the satyagraha and its ensuing publicity did come at an appropri­ ate time to add weight to Ambedkar's words at the Round Table Confer­ ences , and while his interest in it admittedly was not religious, it is safe to assume that the satyggraha had a life of its own, unrelated to possible political consequences.

Mahars in the Nasik area had been

deeply involved enough in Hinduism to propose a temple of their own at Trymbak, the source of the Godavari river which runs through Nasik, in 1928.

At an earlier date they had constructed a fine ghat on the river

below the Kalaram temple and to one side of the ghats of other Hindus, and it was on that sacred spot that they gathered not only for ritual but for satyagraha meetings.

Given such evidence of devotion, it is

probable that the vast majority of those who took part were genuinely concerned to worship at the temple. In 193^ Gaikwad asked Ambedkar's advice on the continuation of the satyggraha, and Ambedkar replied: It is very kind of you to have asked me for my views on the propriety of the Depressed Classes launching upon a satyagraha at the Kala Ram temple in Nasik on the coming Ram Navim Day. I •^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 159•. ^Lelah Dusnkin makes this point in her excellent thesis, The Policy of Indian National Congress Toward the Depressed Classes - an Historical Study, unpublished M.A. thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1957- Although Ambedkar made use of Nasik Satyagraha publicity in London, the control of the satyggraha was in the hands of local Nasik leaders who were motivated more by social and religious than political considerations.

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have no hesitation in saying that such a move would he quite uncalled for and should not merely be suspended but should be stopped altogether. Thie msy appear strange and surprising coming as it does from one who was the author of the Satyagraha. But I am [not] afraid to declare this change of front. I did not launch the temple entry movement because I wanted the Depressed Class to become worshippers of idols which they were prevented from worshipping or because I believed that temple entry would make them equal members in and an integral part of the Hindu Society. So far as this aspect of the case is con­ cerned I would advise the Depressed Class to insist upon a complete overhauling of Hindu Society and Hindu theology before they consent to become an integral part of Hindu Society. I started temple entry Satyagraha only because I felt that was the best way of energising the Depressed Class and making them conscious of their position. As I believe I have achieved that therefore I have no more use for temple entry. I want the Depressed Class to concentrate their energy and resources on politics and education and I hope that they will realize the importance of both.^° Even after Ambedkar's advice to stop, the satySgraha lingered on into 1935.

Temple entry was not achieved, but Nasik's rich pilgrim

trade was widely disrupted through at least part of the satyagraha period.

More important, the effort made an impact on the Mahar

community down to the village level.

The satySgraha came to a close

with Ambedkar's announcement in 1935 that he no longer considered himself a Hindu.

It is no accident that his speech was made at Yeola,

in Nasik District, where enormous effort had gone into a mass under­ taking to breech the walls of Hindu orthodoxy. Ambedkar's Methods:

Newspapers

Co-existent with the holding of large and small conferences were other methods of modernizing the thinking of the Untouchable community, chiefly through newspapers and organizations for service. 5®Letter from B. R. Ambedkar in Bombay to B. K. Gaikwad, March 3, 193^. Letter in the possession of B. K. Gaikwad.

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Again, Ambedkar was not the originator of these methods, but developed them to a greater extent than had his predecessors, and used them in correlation with the political struggle of the period.

Ambedkar's

establishing of a Marathi newspaper at the earliest possible date in his career, 1920, was in keeping with Maharashtrian movement patterns in general.

However, his potential audience among Untouchables 5 9 and

caste Hindu sympathizers, was small and his financial backing slight. Ambedkar's first two newspapers, Muknayak, begun in 1920, and Bahishkyit Bharat (Excluded India), founded in 1927* had a life-span of only a few years.

His third, Janata (The People), begun in 1929* was pub­

lished with more consistency until it was superseded by Prabuddha Bharat (Awakened India) in 1955The first issue of Muknayak appeared on January 31, 1920.

The

editorials of that issue and thirteen subsequent issues were written by Ambedkar, although the first Mahar to pass the university matricula­ tion examination, P. N. Bhatkar, was named editor.^0 Underneath the heading was a quatrain by the bhakti poet-saint Tukaram suggesting the source of the newspaper's name: • ^ A c c o r d i n g to the 1921 Census, there were 5*259 literate Mahars in the Central Division of Bombay Province, 288 of them literate in English. Census of India. 1921. Vol. VIII Bombay Presidency. Part II. Tables (Bambaj': Government Central Press, 1$22), p. 21. gQ P. N. Bhatkar, according to Khairmode, had matriculated in 1906, the first Mahar to achieve that degree of education, and had attended Ferguson College for two years. He was married to a Saraswat Brahman widow who was associated with V. R. Shinde. However, his work was not satisfactory, and the managing body of M u k n S y a k turned the charge of the paper over to D. D. Gholap. Khairmode, PS. Ambedkar, Vol. I, p. 271-272.

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Why should I feel shy? I have laid aside hesitation and opened my mouth. Here, on earth, no notice is taken of a dumb creature; No real good can be secured by over-modesty. 1 In his first editorial, Ambedkar notes the newspapers which discuss the issues of the Depressed Classes, and also those which had been published especially for the consideration of the problem of untouchability, Somvanshiya Mitr, Hin Edwin Montagu, Secretary of State

for India, announced that the policy of the British Government was "that of the increasing association of Indians in every branch of the administration and the gradual development of self-governing institutions."

The announcement was followed by a tour of India

in the cool season of 1917-1918 during which Montagu and the Viceroy of India, Lord Chelmsford, heard testimony from Indian groups on their wishes for the forthcoming reforms.

Twenty-one

presentations were made to the touring group by low caste groups. Of these, at least eleven represented the "Depressed Classes" Panchamas, "Oppressed Classes," Adi-Andhra, Ezhuvas,

*7

and Buddhists

P

Saint Nihai Singh, in The Indian Review, September 1910, reprinted in The Depressed Classes, p. 89. See also Nihal Singh's article, "India's 'Untouchables'" in Contemporary Review, Vol. 103 (March 1913), pp. 376-85, for a review of Untouchables' progress at the time. ^The Ezhuvas (Iravas, Illuvans) began their political protest with the Malayalee Memorial of 1891-92 and continued with frequent pleas for political representation in the councils of the state of Travancore. See A. K. Gopalan, Kerala Past and Present (London: Lawrence & Wisehart, 1959-) This petition was from those Ezhuvas (or Tiyas) living in the Malabar portion of Madras Presidency. ®The Buddhists of South India may have included others than Untouchables in their ranks. Their organized efforts in temple building seem to have begun about 1907, and according to Mother A. Fiske's findings, those groups now are chiefly identified with the Scheduled Castes.

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in South India; Dheds, the Depressed Classes Mission Society, and the Depressed India Association in Bombay; and the Namashudras in Bengal. A close look at the circumstances of these petitions, however, indicates that most were the result of outside political influences. Although Untouchables in the south and Bombay had used the petition method much earlier to ask for favors or rights from government, they seemed not yet ready to speak at this high level entirely on their own. The southern groups were in some cases allied with the Dravidian movement, and like that Non-Brahman multitude, were fearful that reform would bring even more Brahman domination.^

The Madras

Adi-Dravida Jana Sabha (organization of pre-Dravidian people) told the Montagu-Chelmsford tour in an informal address: We shall fight to the last drop of our blood any attempt to transfer the seat of authority from British hands to so-called high caste Hindus who have ill-treated us in the past and would do so again but for the protection of British laws. In Bombay, the political interest of other groups in the Untouchables can be clearly seen.

Just before Montagu arrived

in India in 1917, the Depressed Classes Mission Society, an educational group growing out of the Prarthana Samaj and guided ^See Eugene Irschick, Politics and Social Conflict in South India: The Non-Brahmin Movement and Tamil Separatism, 191&-1929» Ph.D. Thesis, University of Chicago, 196 k , for a review of the NonBrahman movement in Madras. The political party of that movement, the Justice Party, adopted the cause of the Panchamas or outcastes as part of its platform in 1917, but as in the case of Non-Brahmans and Untouchables in Maharashtra, there was little consistent coopera­ tion and much mutual criticism among Non-Brahmans and Untouchables. 10Addresses Presented in India to His Excellency the Viceroy 4

-

c-xxu. oxic

’ OO.

x\u.

xXojxj »

mu

,-.4.,.^... .-.4*

J.ixcr D c u r c u f c U . W 1

1918) (Cmd. 9178 Pari. Pap. 1918:

04. «*4-_

Ouauc

iw;

J 4 «->«%

j.uux»u

(T

\.uwuuwu.

XVIII), p. 60.

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17

i *.•

M

-1U5-

by a Maratha reformer, Vithal Ramji Shinde, held a conference. N. R. Chandavakar, u Brahman member of the Prarthana Samaj and an ex-Congress president, chaired the conference, and it was reported that 2500 members of the Depressed Classes attended.

The Conference

r^oti'iVea to support the 1916 Congress-League agreement on selfgovernment and, as if in return for its allegiance, asked "The Indian National Congress to pass at its forthcoming session a distinct and independent resolution declaring to the people of India at large the necessity, justice and righteousness of removing all the disabilities imposed by religion and custom on the Depressed Classes."^- Congress did pass such a resolution, its first statement on the problem of untouchability, and the Depressed Classes Mission Society Conference’s resolution in support of Congress was duly entered in the MontaguChelmsford ledger of opinion.

This, however, is one of few instances

of an Untouchable organization supporting Congress at this time. Another conference, held in Bombay a week after the Depressed Classes Mission meeting, provides a better forecast of future Untouchable political action.

Although this conference was also

called by a caste Hindu, he represented a Non-Brahman group somewhat similar to the Non-Brahman organization of Madras.

Bapuji Namdeo

Bagade chaired a conference of 2000 in Bombay in November, 1917* the main purpose of which seems to have been to deny support to the Congress-League scheme.

This conference supported the demand for

^Quoted in B. R. Ambedkar, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done To The Untouchables, p. 15. See also Addresses Presented in India, The resolution passed by Congress was similar in phrasing to this resolution.

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communal electores made by the Depressed India Association, a group with Vidarbha Mahar and Non-Brahman leadership. 12

No information is

available sibcuw the nature of the petition of the "Dheds," the third group from Bombay to petition the Montagu-Chelmsford tour. It is probable that they were Gujarati Untouchables.

I -5

Although these three Bombay petitions reflect an urge of some sort to join in the political movement, two were the result of caste Hindu leadership and the third was from an organization not heard from again.

The Depressed Class Mission Conference reflected the

consciousness on the part of the elite that their nationalist claims should reflect the aim of all the Indian people.

The second confer­

ence, guided by a Maratha, may have been inspired not only by the democratizing spirit of the Non-Brahmans but also by the fact that they too wanted communal electorates to free themselves from Brahman domination. The resolutions of both conferences were officially presented, but Montagu, himself, in An Indian Diary, made no special reference ■^Ambedkar, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done To The Untouch­ ables , pp. 15-l6. A Depressed India Association was begun in Poona in 1917 with Walchand Ramchandra Kothari, a Non-Brahman, as organizer. Those who called on Montagu, however, in the name of the Depressed India Associa­ tion were Dougre and Vasnik, who were Non-Brahmans, and the Vidarbha Mahars , Gawai and Bansode. N£ Ra. Shent^e, G.S. Gawai; Vyakti HLpT KSrya (the man and his work), (Amraoti: Prabhakar Pandurang Bhatkar, 1963), pp. 32-33. Another organization with the same name, the Depressed India Association, began in Nagpur in 1919 with an Englishman, G. P. Dick, as President and the Mahar G. M. Thaware as a memt-j-r. (Informa­ tion from V. K. Moon of Nagpur.) T O

J—’Dhed was used as a derogatory word for Mahar generally and as a synonym for Mahar in Census lists, but was also a Gujarati Untouchable caste.

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to the problems of the Depressed Classes in Bombay except to note: "Then (December 27, 1917) we had Rai Bahadur Dougre on behalf of the depressed classes.

He was a very nice fellow, taking a great interest

in the depressed classes.

He is a caste Hindu, and he brought along

with him two Untouchables, who struck me, although one did not speak English, by their extraordinary intelligence.

He thinks that communal

representation for them is necessary..."^* Specific recommendations for the political rights of the Depressed Classes do not appear until the Franchise Committee, with Lord Southborough as Chairman, toured India in 1918-1919 to determine the nature of the electorate.

At least two conferences were held in

Bombay between Montagu's tour and that of Southborough to gain backing for Depressed Class positions.

Concern among nationalist leaders for

the rising interest in politics among the Depressed Classes was shown by Bal Gangadhar Tilak's appearance at the All India Depressed Classes Conference in March, 1918, held by the Depressed Classes Mission Society of India.

The Gaikwad of Baroda served as President of the

Conference and Sir N. Chandavarkar as Chairman of the Reception Committee.

It was at this conference that Tilak made his famous

statement, "If a God were to tolerate untouchability, I would not recognise him as God at all.

However, when Vithal Ramji Shinde

brought out a memorandum for the removal of untouchability, Tilak ^Edwin S. Montagu, An Indian Diary, edited by Venetia Montagu. (London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1930), p. 306. Dougre was from Kolhapur. The Untouchable who knew English was probably G. A. Gawai, the one who did not Kisan Fago Bansode. See footnote 12. "^Quoted in G. P. Bradhan and A. K. Bhagwat, Lokamanya Tilak, A Biography, (Bombay: Jaico Publishing House, 1959)» P* 306.

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refused to join other caste Hindus in signing it

a discrepancy in

behavior that was not lost on the Depressed Classes. IT1 Later in the year, another conference was held in Bombay to consider the political rights of the Untouchables, this one under the leadership of Sufchedar Ganpatrao Govind Rokde, probably a Mahar.

This group demanded separate

electorates and opposed the resolution passed by the Depressed Classes Mission Society that the Legislative Council should select representstives from the Untouchable community rather than allow that group direct election.^"® The Southborough Committee on Franchise When the Southborough Commission gathered evidence concerning the franchise in its tour of 1S18 - 1919, Mahar leadership was ready with clear and specific requests for Depressed Class participation in the political process.

Testimony by Ambedkar revealed a sophisticated

and politically aware approach to the political aspect of Mahar aspira­ tions, but the appearance o

Mahar, G. A. Gawai of Amraoti in

Berar, indicates that Ambedkar was not alone in his recognition of the R. Shinde told this story in S. V. Bapat, ed. , Lokamanya Tilkancha Atavani va Akhyarika (Reminiscences and Recollections of Lokamanya Tilak), TPoona, 192U-28, Vol. 2), p. 205, quoted in Pradhan and Bhagwat, Lokamanya Tilak, p. 306. In his testimony before the Southborough Commission, Ambedkar used this incident as an example of lip sympathy shown by the "Brahman oligarchy" to hoodwink Untouchables. I have also heard the story from present day Makars. ift Khairmo^e, Da. Ambedkar, I, pp. 266-267.

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political avenues opening up for Mahar activity.

Gawai spoke19 on

behalf of the Depressed India Association, which claimed 500 members in the Central Provinces, Berar and Bombay Province.

He stressed

many of the same matters as Ambedkar did, asking for a separate electorate for the Depressed Classes since "the classes of people whom this association claims to represent feel very strongly on the question of separate electorates."

He indicated the need for Depressed

Classes to be part of the administrative process, noting that there was not a single clerk in government service in Nagpur (capital of the Central Provinces and Berar) from the Depressed Classes.

He noted the

low state of education among Depressed Classes, but claimed achievement in the three or four matriculates in Central Provinces and Berar and in the college graduate (who was Ambedkar, although Gawai does not mention his name) in Bombay.

His hopes for the educative process of

democracy were similar to Ambedkar's, i.e. that improving the status of the lower communities will enable them "to merge successfully in the higher castes.

The necessary stimulus will be forthcoming only under a

system which ensures genuine and adequate representation of all classes and creeds." %he- Reforms Committee (Franchise), Evidence Taken Before The Reforms Committee, Vol. I, (Calcutta: Government of India, 1919), pp. 278 - 279- G. A. Gawai, who is still living, was active in educational and political work during the 1920's and '30's in the Vidarbha area of Maharashtra, then Central Provinces and Berar. He joined neither Ambedkar's political party nor the Congress, although he did cooperate with the Hindu Mahasabha. He served as a member of the Legislative Council later in the Central Provinces. Considered an articulate and dignified spokesman by the Mahars, although he had studied only up to matriculation, he was often called upon to voice Depressed Class sentiment, but he seems not to have had a mass following.

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Gawai’s testimony is less elaborate, less professional than Ambedkar's but it reflects a similar recognition of the possibilities of securing educational and political rights in a democratizing nation without reference to religion.

Gawai's distrust of the

advanced castes was as great or greater than Ambedkar's, and as if to underline Gawai's accusation that the higher castes did not consider the needs of the lower, Rao Bahadur R. N. Mudholkar, a Brahman and an ex-Congress President, testified next to the Southborough Committee that the Depressed Classes were too backward to elect their own representatives, "not all of them were so intelligent as the Mahars," and suggested one seat by nomination in preference to Gawai's suggestion of three seats by election. 20 Ambedkar, who testified to the Southborough Commission in Bombay21 without any organizational identification, spoke both as an advisor to the British on the total matter of the Bombay franchise and as a pleader for the rights of Untouchables.

In ten pages of

closely printed material, ranging far beyond demands for Depressed Class rights, he urged joint electorates with reserved seats for r

Mohammedans, lest communal representation sharpen the angularity of division between Hindu and Muslim, and a low-pitched franchise for the Marathas, which he felt would serve that large community better than reserved seats or separate electorates in allowing them a voice "free from Brahmandomination." ^The Reforms Committee (Franchise), ^The Reforms Committee (Franchise), p. 729-739.

But he argued that Evidence, Vol. I, p. 283. Evidence, Vol. II,

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Untouchables, whom he characterized as "slaves," "dehumanized," and so "socialized as never to complain," must have communal representation "in such numbers as will enable them to claim redress."

The franchise

for Depressed Classes should be "so low as to educate into political life as many Untouchables as possible." Ambedkar did not claim that the Untouchables deserved communal representation because they were adi-Hindu (pre-Hindu) or of a different race or culture than the Hindu community, but because they were separate due to isolation.

Although claims to pre-Aryan

status had been made by some Mahar leaders, chiefly Walangkar and Bansode, and although this was a common belief o f both Indian and English authorities on Western Indian castes, Ambedkar rejected this basis for separateness, probably because it implied a racial difference rather than one that could be overcome in time.

He felt

that Untouchables must be represented separately from the caste Hindus because there was no "like-mindedness," no "endosmosis" between Touchables and Untouchables (the words recall Ambedkar's student days with John Dewey and Franklin Giddings at Columbia.) He told the Commission that "British rule in India was meant to provide equal opportunities for all, and that in transferring a large share of the power to popular assemblies, arrangements should be made whereby the hardships and disabilities entailed by the social system should not be reproduced and perpetuated in political institutions." Even though there was only one B. A. (Ambedkar himself), six or seven matriculates, and twenty-five or so men among the Untouchables

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in Bombay Province whose English would be equal to representing their cause in the Council, Ambedkar asked for a representation of nine men from the Depressed Classes in a Bombay Legislative Council of 100. One from the nine, according to his plan, would be chosen by them to serve on the Central Legislative Council in Delhi. The testimony of Ambedkar and Gawai seems to be the only direct evidence from the Depressed Classes on franchise matters to the Southborough Commission.

The other politically vocal group of

Untouchables, those of Madras, followed the lead of the Non-Brahmans in that province and refused to appear before the committee.

The Non-

Brahmans boycotted the committee "in view of the partial and partisan character of the Franchise Committee, in view of the studied silence of the Government towards the influential and indignant protests of Non-Brahmins in this matter, and in view of the homage paid by Government to the advocates of Brahmin oligarchy in preference to Indian democracy." objection.

22

The Madras Adi Dravida Jana Sabha added its own

One member of the commission, V. S. Shreenivasa Sastriar,

they saw as a "champion and apologist of Brahmin oligarchy."

The other,

Surendra Nath Banerjee, had won their disfavor by advising them "to enlist in the German Army fighting against freedom and civilization" because they had said in their address to Montagu and Chelmsford that they would fight any transfer of power from the British to the high caste Hindus. 23 ^The Reforms Committee (Franchise), Evidence, Vol. I, p. 281.

.

^The Reforms Committee (Franchise), Evidence, Vol. I, pp. 28l-

282

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Not only were Mahars the only Depressed Class representatives to testify to.the Southborough Commission, but also Maharashtrian caste Hindus seem to have been the only elite who advised that special representation be given the Depressed Classes. other province -

Bombay more than any

-ttod an awareness among caste Hindus of the need

for attention to the political representation of the Depressed Classes. In that province, V. R. Shinde, founder of the Depressed Classes Mission, spoke strongly and without condescension for nine reserved seats to be filled by the Depressed Classes themselves through voting in separate electorates, although this testimony contradicts the earlier Depressed Classes Mission conference resolution for indirect election.

V. J. Patel, R. P. Paranjpye, V. R. Kothari of the Deccan

Ryots Association, H. N. Apte of the Deccan Sabha, II. C. Kelkar, N. M. Joshi of the Servants of India Society and B. V. Jadhav, NonBrahman party leader, all asked for seats for the Depressed Classes specifically.

Two, Jadhav and Joshi, specified separate electorates.

2k

Some of this testimony by Marathas and Brahmans undoubtedly was related to the concern of Marathas for communal electorates for their own group, but the presence of Brahmans as well as Marathas among this kind of witness reflects the liberal attitude of caste Hindu reformers in Bombay and their recognition of the political awareness of the Depressed Classes, particularly the Mahars. The lack of similar support to Depressed Classes' claims for political recognition in other provinces indicates that the Mahar 2k.

The Reforms Committee franchisej , Evidence, Vol. II, pp. 723-

793.

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movement's energy owed something to its environment.

In the u'.P. ,

Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya and Moti Lai Nehru noted that "if facts could he shown which necessitated the representation of the depressed classes, the Congress would gladly agree..." but added, "their lack of education made election impossible at p r e s e n t . I n Bengal, Ambika Charan Mazumdar "would allow Mahishyas and Nemasudras to have two nominated representatives if Government considered that was necessary and because there was a clamour for it, but...they [the Depressed Classes] had no interest apart from the interest of the general body of the population."26

Given the lack of concern about,

or the disapproval of,'special representation in other provinces, the witnessing of the need for Depressed Class representation by eight Brahmans and Marathas sets Bombay aside as a province unusually open to recognition of the political facet of the social problem. On the governmental level, however, Bombay showed less sensitivity to the need of the Depressed Classes than did Madras. In contrast to the concern shown by the report of the Government of Madras, the note prepared by the Government of Bombay gave scant attention to the Depressed Classes, nor did it reflect the interest of the caste Hindus in Bombay in the political aspirations of the Untouch­ ables.

Tiie Bombay Government recommended that no form of special

representation be given the Depressed Classes because of the difficulty of defining these classes and because of the lack of electorates^ of ^The Reforms Committee (Franchise), Evidence, Vol. I, p. 111. The Reforms Committee (Franchise), Evidence, Vol. II, p. U35>

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"sufficient intelligence."^ In spite of Ambedkar and Gavai's testimony and that of Bombay liberals, the Franchise Committee did not grant elected representation to the Depressed Classes in the new reformed legislatures.

Two

nominated seats for Untouchables were allowed in the Madras Legisla­ tive Council, one each in the provinces of Bombay, Uttar Pradesh, Bengal, Bihar and the Central Provinces.

The difficulty of creating

satisfactory electorates outweighed the strong direct demands from Bombay and the tentative rumblings elsewhere. This meager recognition troubled not only Untouchables but also the Joint Select Committee considering the Government of India Bill in London, the Government of India, and the Reforms Enquiry Committee (the Muddiman Committee) which met in 192U for a review of the first three years of the working of dyarchy.

PR

A telegram from a

group not identifiable, the "Bombay Untouchables" with Pandurang Bhatkal as President, was sent to the Joint Select Committee in London in 1919 in. protest of the Franchise Committee's report: ^ Report of the Franchise Comm-i ttee, (London: (Cmd-.lbl, Pari Pap. 1919:XVl), p. 136.

H.M.S.O., 1919)

PR

Dyarchy referred to the arrangement of governmental depart­ ments in the provinces into "transferred" and "reserved" categories, with the intention of giving some direct responsibility to legislative councils in non-sensitive areas. The transferred departments, such as education, were administered by ministers appointed by the Governor on the recommendation of the majority party in the provincial councils. Other departments, such as home and finance, were administered by ministers appointed by the Governor at his sole discretion. The arrange­ ment was generally unsatisfactory to Indian nationalists. For a review of the Montagu-Chelmsford reforms period, see William Roy Smith, Nationalism and Reform in India (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1938), pp. 83 - 138,

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No deputation for want of funds, but communal representation proportionate to numbers strongly urged as enabling to emancipate ourselves from dehumanising socio-religious disabilities imposed on us by cruel brahmanlsm. 9 The Committee received a number of telegrams from Madras as well as this one from Bombay, and strongly recommended "suitable representa­ tion." Chelmsford's Government of India report was also critical of the Franchise Committee's token recognition of the Depressed Classes, and somewhat more generous toward their political aims.

The report

noted that the Franchise Committee "mentions the depressed classes twice, but only to explain that in the absence of satisfactory electorates they have been provided for by nomination. ’It does not discuss the position of these people or their capacity for looking after themselves.

Nor does it explain the amount of nomination which

it suggests for them..."

Chelmsford's committee suggested "enough

representatives of the depressed classes to save them from being entirely submerged, and at the same time to stimulate some capacity for collective action."

In the case of Madras, which had the largest

number of Untouchables, they suggested six seats; for Bengal, the United Provinces, Bihar and Orissa, four; in the Central Provinces •5Q and Bombay, two. A third criticism of the handling of the Depressed Classes by ^9joint Select Committee on the Government of India Bill, Report and Proceedings of the Co™^ttee, Vol. Ill (London: H.M.S.O., 1919-1920T (H.C. 203- 203-Ind. Pari. Pap. 1919:IV), p. lUO. ^Report of the Franchise Committee, Vol. Ill, Views of the Government of India upon the Reports of Lord Southborough'3 Committees (London: H.M.S.O., 1919) (Cmd. 176, Pari. Pap".^1919:XVI)’, pp7 6077

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the Franchise Committee was made by the Muddiman Committee (The Reforms Enquiry Committee) in 192U, which recommended that the Depressed Classes and factory labor be given further representation, by election if possible rather than by nomination.

The admonition on the need

to correct Depressed Class status was so strong that a minority opinion of four members of the Muddiman Committee called the report an unfair exaggeration.

Interestingly enough, in order to substantiate their

judgment that progress was being made and that, after all, the problem could "only be solved by responsible government," the Minority Report quoted from a speech given July 21, 192k t by Sir Frank Sly, Governor of Central Provinces, in reply to an address by a Mahar deputation: During my long service I have seen a great advance among the Depressed Classes, an advance to my mind greater than has been made by any other community within the same period. I have known individuals of the Mahar community rise to positions of importance and wealth and I find them taking part in the trade of the country, and some of the most important contractors are Mahars. Your education is increasing rapidly, and I find a demand amongst Mahars for facilities for primary education. The minority opinion was signed by Tej Bahadur Sapru, P. S. Sivaswamy Aiyer, Muhammad Ali Jinnah and R. P. Paranjpye.

Needless to say the

member of the Muddiman Committee who was himself from the Depressed Classes, Rao Bahadur M. C. Rajah, Honorary Secretary of the Madras Adi-Dravida Mahajana Sabha, did not sign the protest.

It must also

be remembered that neither the Muddiman Report nor the Minority Report ■^Reforms Enquiry Committee, 192k , Report of the Reforms ,Enquiry C«™nftt.e» (London: H.M.S.O., 1925) (CmdT 2360, Pari. Pap. 192l;-1925:X), ppT 5^-55. ^Quoted in the Minority Report, Report of the Reforms Enquiry CornTHttee, p. 1^7.

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were primarily concerned with the Depressed Classes, but with the working of dyarchy in general. As a result of the Muddiman Committee's findings, Depressed Class representation on the Bombay Legislative Council was increased from one to two.

In addition to slightly larger representation

in all the provinces, the Depressed Classes were also allowed a nominated member on the central Legislative Council.

M. C. Rajah

of Madras, who had served on the Madras Legislative Council and who had written the first book on the Untouchables from within the group itself,^ was selected in 1927 to fill this seat. Mahar Participation in the Legislature Within Bombay itself, men who were active in the Mahar move­ ment were selected by nomination to serve on the Legislative Councils.

On the advice of Sir Narayan Ganesh Chandavakar, a

member of Shinde's Depressed Classes Mission Society, the Government nominated D. D. Gholap to the first council in 1921.

A Satara

Mahar with a meager education but with some experience as Ambedkar's •^M. C. Rajah's book, The Oppressed Hindus (Madras: The Huxley Press, 1925), is the first book on the Depressed Classes in English by a member of the group. A book by T. B. Pandian, a Christian, entitled Slaves of the Soil in Southern India (Amsterdam, 1899)» preceded it, but the author's background is not known. The predominance of the Madras Depressed Classes in early political agitation should be noted. M. C. Rajah became Rao Bahadur, a British honorary title in 1922, after his entrance in the Legislative Council in Madras as the first "Adi Dravida" member. As in the case of Ambedkar, his grand­ father was an army man. His book indicates that he was well informed on the achievements of Depressed Class individuals all over India. At the time of writing, he states that he was a Fellow of Madras University and Superintendent of the Wesley College Lower School.

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research assistant for the report to the Southborough Committee and as an editor of Ambedkar's first newspaper, Muknayak, Gholap functioned in the Council very much in accord with the tninkirs of Ambedkar.

He presented a resolution requesting free and

compulsory education, a demand first made by G. K. Gokhale in 1911> and repeated by Depressed Class conference resolutions.

The

resolution was in tune with Maharashtrian thinking and was carried by the Legislative Council itself, but not accepted by government.^ Gholap's second resolution reflected Ambedkar's position on the Mahar watan. The possession of watan land tied the Mahar to traditional village service but the amount of land was generally not large enough to maintain its possessor by its yield.

Although

Mahars as a group seemed to favor the retention of their watan, Ambedkar attempted for years to break the tie legally and to educate the community to reject the implications of the watan in­ heritance.

Gholap's recommendation was the first of many attempts.

His recommendation that Mahar watan land be considered ryotwari (the common term for land held by a peasant) and hence eligible for sale did not pass. 35 While Mahar resolutions met with failure, caste Hindus end ■aL. Bombay 1921 - 1922 - A Review of the Administration of the Presidency (Bombay: Government Central Press, 1923), pp. ^3 - ^ • A proposal for compulsory primary education had been made as early as 1911 by G. K. Gokhale, and a committee had been appointed in 1921 under the chairmanship of Sir Narayan Chandavakar to inquire into the practicability of compulsory free primary education. Anjilvel V. Matthew, Karnaveer Bhaurao Patil (Satara: Rayat Shiksan Sansta, 1957) p. 15735Bombay Legislative Council Debates, 1923. quoted in Khairmode, PS. Atpbedkar, Vol. II, p. 33.

Vol. Ill, p. 587

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government proceeded with various reforms.

R. P. Paranjpye, the

first Minister of Education, opened a Depressed Classes Hostel in Poona in 1922, the first such governmental institution in Bombay Province.

Paranjpye indicates that not only were the fifty Depressed

Class students accommodated at the Poona Hostel given board and lodging, but their fees were paid at the local educational institution they attended.2

In his autobiography, Paranjpye also notes that he, after

observing Depressed Class students sitting on the verandah at public schools, issued an order that no schools under public management which discriminated would receive government grants.^

Paranjpye's order was

reinforced by a resolution moved in the Legislative Council by S. K. Bole, a Hindu reformer from the Bhandari caste

who had attended the

matriculation celebration for Ambedkar in 1908 and who maintained a cordial relationship with him to the end of his long life.

The

resolution read: R. P. Paranjpye, Eighty-Four - Not Out (Delhi: The Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 1961), pp. 8l - 82. ■JiAmbedkar commented to the Simon Commission in 1929 that Dr. Paranjpye had made a "bold attempt" to educate all classes but that his "circular regarding admission of the Depressed Classes to Schools is being evaded." Report of the Indian Statutory Commission, III, p. 109. 3®The Bhandari were traditionally toddy tappers, but one section of the caste advanced early in the modern period through sea­ faring and naval enterprises. At least three Bhandari were associated with Dr. Ambedkar's movement. It is reported that the Depressed Classes of Bombay were so pleased with Bole's efforts on their behalf that they held a congratulatory meeting in his honor, awarding him a gold medal. It was the Bole Resolution that was tested by the Mahad Satyagraha described in Chapter Two.

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The Council recommends that the Untouchable Classes be allowed to use all public watering-places, wells and dharmshalas which are built and maintained out of public funds or administered by bodies appointed by Government or created by Statute, as well as public schools, courts, offices and 39 d i s p e n s a r i e s .

An attempt to put teeth in what proved to be am ineffective measure was made in 1926 by a resolution advising the Government not to grant funds to municipalities which did not observe the rule, but it is doubtful if this was carried into effect. A year after the Hostel'in Poona was opened, the Primary Education Act of 1923 made provision for 100 scholarships for the Backward Classes in Upper Primary Schools. 1+0 Another Act took into consideration the Depressed Class demand for some administrative control.

The Local Boards Act of 1923 allowed for the nomination by

Government of a Depressed Class member to any local board whose constituency included sufficient numbers of Depressed Classes to require such representation, provided there was a qualified Untouch­ able willing to serve.

An explanatory footnote to the Act indicates

that the interests and the disabilities of the Depressed Classes had been a subject of discussion in the Council and that a plea made for 111 direct election to the Local Boards had been rejected. In the second and third Legislative Councils in Bombay, ■^Keer, Dr_. Ambedkar, p. 53. ^ Welfare of the Scheduled Castes in Bombay State (Bombay: Government of Bombay, Directorate of Publicity, 1956), pp. U7-1+8. k^-A. E. Cumming, The Bombay Local Boards Manual., 3rd edition (Bombay: Government Central Press, 1925), pp. 6 - 8'. There are records of Mahars serving on local boards in the Vidarbha area long before this Act was passed in Bombay.

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192t-1930, B. R. Ambedkar, R. S. Nikalji, a Mahar, and P. G. Solanki, a Gujarati Untouchable, b2 served as Depressed Class representatives. No new legislation resulted from their work as legislators, but the pace of reform continued.

By the time the Hartog Committee

made its

report on the state of education in India in 1929, Bombay had the highest percentage nf‘ Depressed Class children in school of all the provinces.

While 5.1% of the total population in Bombay was -under

instruction, the percentage for the Depressed Classes was U.i. figures are in startling contrast to those of Punjab: population, 1.1% for the Depressed Classes.

5.2%

The

for the

Madras Province, with

its huge Untouchable population, was below Bombay, in spite of its governmental and Christian mission effort, with figures of 5.8% and )O 3.5% for the population and the Depressed Classes respectively. Ambedkar's position in the Legislative Assembly may have been the factor enabling him to secure the first gazetted post in the Civil Service for an Untouchable.

M. K. Jadhav, a Mahar who had

secured a B.A. in Sanskrit with second class honors from New Poona College in 1925, was appointed Deputy Collector in Bijapur District sometime in 1927 or 1928, and the credit for this new venture in k2 Dr. P. G. Solanki was a graduate of Bombay University and a long time associate of Dr. Ambedkar's. How strong Gujarati Depressed Classes' support of Ambedkar was in Bombay is not known. There are Gujaratis currently involved in the Peoples' Education Society founded later by Ambedkar and there is now an active Buddhist group in Ahmedabad. R. S. Nikalji was a Mahar and a Bombay leader of some stature, but never attached to Ambedkar's organizations. ^Indian Statutory Commission, Interim Report. Review of Growth of Education in British India, by the Auxiliary Committee appointed by the Commission. Sir Philip Hartog, Chairman. (London: H.M.S.O., 1929) (Cmd. 3^07, Pari. Pap. 1928/29:X), p. 219. Chapter X is devoted to "Education of the Depressed Classes."

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government policy is given to Ambedkar.^ Solanki's most successful move during his tenure as Legislative Council representative was to move a resolution in 1928 for an enquiry into the educational, social and economic condition of the Depressed Classes and Aboriginal Tribes.^

A committee was

established with O.H.B. Starte, Criminal Tribes Settlement Officer as its head, Solanki, Ambedkar, Lt. Col. Burfoot of the Salvation Army, A. V. Thakkar of the Servants of India Society, and four other caste Hindus as its members.

The Starte Committee’s report,

'T■ issued m 1930,' recommended that "if the Al-Azhar should see fit to undertake any direct work, it would be the founding of centres for the spread of Islamic culture and of the message of Islam in the following places:

Keral (SU Deccan), Surat, Deekka in Little

Bengal, Rangoon, Nagpur."^®

(Of these five places, only Nagpur is in

the Mahar area.) The group also recommended that A1 Jtzhar should accept as students five "outcaste matriculates," should give financial assistance to the association of Ulama at Lucknow in return for their receiving twenty Untouchable boys, should give assistance to the Islamic Society at Nagpur in return for the Society's opening new classes to Untouchable boys, and should aid in the preaching of Islam among Depressed Classes in Kerala.

Muslim help was offered more

directly to Ambedkar, it was rumored during these days of conversion ^ The Depressed Classes, pp. H7-U8. 5 ° Q u o t e d

from Oriente Moderno, July, 1936, in The Depressed

Classes, p. 232. ^Quoted from Qriente Moderno, September, 1936, in The Depressed Classes, pp. 23S-2L0. ^Quoted from Al-Ahram, June 1, 1937, in The Depressed Classes, p. 1*55-^56.

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-222fever, in the form of a contribution from the Nizam of Hyderabad, although this donation is not documented. 6l Although it is probable that Ambedkar did not ever seriously contemplate joining the Muslim community, he found it convenient to reiterate the possibility of the Untouchables’ becoming Muslim.

On

October 11, 1939, in the context of a comment on the demand that "had been raised to divide India into Hindu and Muslim India," he said that "he found it very difficult to dissuade his community from merging itself in some other larger community.

I hope that wisdom and

statesmanship will dawn on the Congress in time to prevent India from being divided into two parts, and scheduled classes merging themselves with a powerful and influential minority." 62 It was with the Sikh community that Ambedkar most seriously considered merging.

Sikhism had the advantage of being an Indian

founded religion so that becoming a Sikh involved no loss of patriotism. The militant image of the Sikh was as great as that of the Muslim, an important factor in Ambedkar's campaign to free the Untouchable from go

servility.

The Sikhs had already absorbed many Untouchables in the

Panjab into Sikhism and for years had carried on a campaign of conversion.

The fact that Untouchables in Sikhism remained a somewhat

^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 262. I have also heard this rumor directly from Buddhists in Maharashtra, although a later date was indicated. Unidentified (probably Times of India) news clipping for October 11, 1939, in the Khairmoday Collection at Bombay University Library. 6^a Nagpur Sikh (formerly Mahar) informed me that Ambedkar was very sympathetic with his conversion and had referred more them once to the strength and militancy of the Sikhs.

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separate community mitigated against the idea of equality, hut also provided a channel through which special benefits in educational policies and government services as well as in reserved seats in legislatures might continue.

The Sikhs had been acknowledged as a

group deserving of separate electorates, and although that right obtained only in the Panjab, it offered a precedent which might be applied to other parts of India. Ambedkar attended the Sikh Mission Conference in Amritsar on April 13-1^, 1936, along with Depressed Class members from the Panjab, Kerala, United Provinces and Central Provinces.

Over fifty people

converted to Sikhism at this conference, including five Tiyas from Kerala, but none of them were from Bombay.^

There is an unverified

story that Ambedkar spoke to a Sikh group at this time, asking them if they were willing to allow inter-marriage between Sikhs and new converts, and the Sikhs responded affirmatively.^

jn September of

the same year, a group of Ambedkar's followers, "none of whom was a scholar or a first-rate A m b e d k a r i t e w e r e sent to Amritsar to study Sikhism.

They exceeded their instructions to study and converted to

the Sikh religion, but disappeared into obscurity when they returned ^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 266. Some converts from the Central Provinces were reported, and may have been Mahars. In the decade from 1921-1931 in the Punjab, the number of Sikhs increased above expectation by 5^2,576 persons. A large number were no doubt from the Depressed Classes.(Census of India, 1931, Vol. XVII, Punjab, Part 1, Report, (Lahore, 1933), p. 306. Untouchables, however, generally entered the Mazbi Sikh sect, which worshipped in Sikh gurdwaras but was considered somewhat socially inferior. ^conversation with C. B. Khairmoday, January, 1965^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 282.

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to Bombay.

The eagerness of the Sikhs to include Ambedkar and his

followers in their fold may best be seen by the creation of Khalsa College in Bombay as an earnest of their desire and ability to aid the Depressed Classes.

There is no documentation that Khalsa College

was planned, designed and staffed by Ambedkar and financed by the Sikhs, but that story is accepted as true by men close to Ambedkar and is given some verification by the fact that many of the Khalsa faculty were associates of Ambedkar who joined Siddharth College when he established that institution in 19^+6. Support for Ambedkar's conversion to Sikhism came from members of the group that was most concerned with the power and preservation of Hinduism, the Mahasabha.

After conversations with Ambedkar in June

of 1936, Dr. B. S. Moonje, who had represented the H"‘~du Mahasabha at the Bound Table Conferences, began to circulate quietly the idea that the conversion of Untouchables to Sikhism should be approved by Hindu leaders. Among Hindus who condoned such a conversion were M. R. Jayakar and N. D. Savarkar of Bombay, and C. Vijaya Raghavachariya, CT7

an ex-Congress President of Madras.

Dr. Moonje also consulted M. C.

Rajah, the Depressed Classes leader from Madras who had cooperated with him in attempting to solve the Communal Award problem in 1932, but Rajah unexpectedly informed Mahatma Gandhi, C. Rajagopalachari and Pandit Malaviya, all of whom disapproved, and released letters from Moonje and Ambedkar to the press.

The Moonje agreement drew severe

criticism from Gandhi, who said, "I do not at all understand Dr. Moonje 1Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 276. The Moonje-Ambedkar correspond­ ence is reproduced in the Indian Annual Register, 1936, Vol. IIpp. 276-279-

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on Dr. Ambedkar's position...it can never be a question of barter for me.ntlD Ambedkar defended the idea of conversion to Sikhism, saying that Gandhi's position during the Poona Pact conference had been one of barter, that Shankaracharya Dr. Kurtakoti approved of the conver­ sion, end that ”it vas a number of prominent Hindus who took the initiative and pressed it on me.

IfI have gone to the length of

considering it an alternative, it isbecause I felt a certain amount of responsibility for the fate of the Hindus."^ Ambedkar left for England on November 11, 1936, probably with the purpose of sounding out British statesmen on safeguards in the new constitution for Depressed Class converts to Sikhism.

The result of

his conversation evidently was that reserved seats for Sikhs would be granted only in the Panjab, but after Ambedkar's return in mid-January, 1937, there was no announcement of any decision, and contact with the Sikhs continued.

Ambedkar spoke to a Sikh group shortly after his

return on the occasion of Guru Govind Singh's birthday, praising Sikhism, but making no promises.^0

In April, R. R. Bhole, a Mahar

closely identified with Ambedkar, appeared at a party honoring six Sikh converts, among them three converted Mahars from Satara. 71

After

this, publicity about the possibility of conversion to Sikhism died away, and the only clue to Ambedkar’s rejection of this conversion ^ The Depressed Classes, p. 153. ^ Times of India, August 8, 1936, quoted in Keer, p. 279-280. ^^Times of India, January 31, 1957, auoted in Depressed Classes, pp. 312-31^ 71

The Depressed Classes, p. 119.

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plan is the trip to England and a note found in the biography of Ambedkar by Dhananjay Keer that Ambedkar and the Sikh Mission author­ ities later "could not hit it off together."^

The total result of

all the interchange was some dozen Mahar Sikh converts and the realization that Ambedkar, for all his threats, was concerned not to injure Hinduism irreparably. The Delay in Conversion Proof that the Mahars actually discontinued Hindu practices as a result of the various conversion resolutions is difficult to obtain. N. V. Gadgil, a sympathetic Brahman observer, wrote that after the conversion announcement of 1935 "the temples of the Gods were not seen in the Mahar quarters."

Another caste Hindu writer noted in 19^1

thatthe new generation of Mahars "do not care for Avalbai [Ambabai]""^ the cholera goddess also called Mariai or Lakshmi whose small temple was usually found in the Maharwacfgr.

This reaction could be the mark of

a more highly educated generation who identified the goddess with the village and with ignorance, however, as well as a response to the conversion idea.

Ambedkar himself, at the celebration of his 50th

birthday in 19^+2 , noted among the improvements in the life of the Scheduled Castes that they had stopped eating dead animals, observing meaningless Hindu customs, and now had the privilege of sending ^^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 288. 7%. Vi. GadgTl, Kahl Motx , Kahi Mohra,p. 221. *^V. II. Barve, "A Note Containing Some Observations on the Harijan Problem in Maharashtra," in Vamanrai A. Bhatt, The Harijans of Maharashtra (Delhi: All India Harijan Sevak Sangh, 19^1), p. ^2.

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representatives to le- .slat•.e.75 not all Hindu practices stopped.

It is safe to assume, however, that There were still Gods in Mahar

quarters to be thrown out when the conversion finally came in 1956. But it is true that no Mahar group attempted temple entry or introduced high caste religious practice into their customs after 1935 > and the very rapidity of response to the actual conversion twenty years after the first announcement meant that a thorough acceptance of the idea bed been secured in the min-'-:; of the Mahars. It is possible to

the conversion activity simply as a

threat to Hindus which might hopefully frighten them into some sort of meaningful action, for an actual conversion would have not only served as propaganda against both Hinduism and the world-image of Indian unity, but also would have cut down on the proportion of Hindu seats, vis-a-vis Muslim, Sikh and body.

istian, in any representative legislative

Ambedkar, however, gave no list of specific steps for Hindus

to take to meet the demands of the Scheduled Castes.

In an address

which was to have been given to the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal (Destruction of Caste Group) in Lahore in 1936 but was cancelled, probably because of Ambedkar's conversion emphasis, he listed the cardinal items in the reform of Hinduism that would change it from a "religion of rules" to a "religion of principles," a change required before it could be a "true religion."

His list of necessary changes, however, betrays a lawyer's

mind at work with an abstract problem that bears little relationship to actual Hinduism.

Among his requirements were (l) one standard book of

Hindu religion, (2) no hereditary priesthood, but an examination system ^Times of India, April 27, 19^2.

(italics mine)

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open to all, (3) state sanads (permits) required for priests, (U) a limit by law on the numbers of priests, (5) state supervision of the priest's morals, beliefs and worship.^

Ten years later, Ambedkar

called for much more practical tests for a reformed Hinduism — inter­ marriage and inter-dining — but reiterated in a more-in-sorrow-thananger-tone the impossibility of Hinduism's genuine acceptance of the Untouchable: It is not possible for the Scheduled Castes to merge themselves into the Hindu community on the basis of a charter of common rights, privileges and removal of all social disabilities ...the question of a merger of the Scheduled Castes into the Hindu community is really dependent upon the wishes of the Hindu com­ munity. The Untouchables have always wished for it and have tried for it, but they have never succeeded in changing the attitude of the Hindus who have always regarded them as outside the pale of Hindu Society...^7 In the same interview, commenting on a statement by a missionary that Untouchables should accept Christianity rather than,Islam, Ambedkar said that Hinduism did not furnish the sort of spiritual home and social communion religion was intended to furnish: that it was not easy to uproot humanity; that the Untouchables were willing to stay where they were if given political safeguards; and that there was no agreement on where to go. The chief reasons for the long delay between the conversion announcement in 1935 and Ambedkar's actual conversion twenty years later were that none of the available choices were suitable both intellectually and politically to him, and, more important, that he had opportunities to work for constitutional change, a method more suited "^B. R: Ambedkar, Annihilation of Caste, pp. 7^-75. 77jaj Bheem (Madras,) December 25, 19^H.

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to his abilities than working for a change of heart, among caste Hindus or building a religious movement among Untouchables.

It must

be noted that he did little organizational work among the Mahars, and none among other castes, to prepare for a conversion.^®

The invitation

to meet with the Iravas was not taken up; the conferences in the North held in his name proceeded without his presence.

The same disinterest

in building an organization will be noted in political affairs. Ambedkar's interest lay in defining issues, awakening the masses by example and oratory, and working on the highest level of politics. His opportunities of functioning in government from 1937 to 1951 pushed the issue of conversion to the rear, never out of sight but not among his major preoccupations.

From 1937 to 1939» he was an elected

member of the Bombay Legislative Assembly; from 19^2 to 19^6 he served as labor member in the Viceroy's Executive council; from 19^6 to 1951 his field of endeavor was the Constituent Assembly and Nehru's first cabinet. There are signs during these years that his mind still turned on the possibility of conversion, and they point to an interest in the religion he seems all along to have felt was his personal choice Buddhism.

In an unpublished foreword to The Buddha and His Dhamma, he

told the story of being given a life of Buddha by Dada (K. A.) Keluskar at a celebration for his l*th standard English examination success and being "greatly impressed'and moved by it."

79

Through the years he was

^®The Bharatiya Bauddh Maha Sabha (Buddhist Society of India) was founded by Ambedkar in 1953, but there is little record of its work before the 1956 conversion. ^^Unpublished foreword' to The Buddha and His Dhamma.

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-230in touch with the reformers and scholars who were sympathetic toward Buddhism such as V. R. Shinde®*"1 and A. R. Kulkarni,®^ and with the O p

work of Bharmanad Kosambi.

In 193^ he named his newly built

home in the Brahman area of Dadar in Bombay Ra.jgriha after the city of Magadha kings in the Buddhist era.

His first college, founded in

19^6 in Bombay, was named Siddharth, one of the personal names of the Buddha, and his second, established in Aurangabad in 1951» Milind, a Greek king whose questions to the Buddhist monk Nagasena are recorded in Milinda Punka= Ambedkar also, long before the Buddhist conversion, began to refer to his "three Gurus:"

The Buddha; Mahatma Phule, the

Non-Brahman reformer and educator of the 19th century; and Kabir, the medieval northern Indian bhakti poet to whose sect Ambedkar's father belonged. The period of Ambedkar's work as Chairman of the Drafting Committee for the Constitution and as Law Minister in Nehru's first

fin Vithal Ramji Shinde founded the Depressed Class Mission for educational work among the Untouchables in 1906. He at one time called himself a Buddhist. Principal M. P. Mangudkar of Shri Shahu Mandir Mahavidyalaya, Poona, reports seeing letters from Ambedkar questioning Shinde on Buddhism in the Shinde papers, dating from some time in the 1920's. On

,^

A. R. Kulkarni, a Brahman from Nagpur, left his law practice in the 1930's to devote his time to a revival of Buddhism. Although he saw Buddhism as a part of Hinduism, he stressed its reform aspects. He had a number of talks with Dr. Ambedkar and wrote an article in the Mahabodhi, Vol. 58, No. 10 (Oct. 1950), pp. 338-3^6, encouraging the conversion of Untouchables to Buddhism. Conversation with A. R. Kulkarni, October, I96I. Q p

Dharmanand Kosambi was'one of the early Buddhist scholars m modern India. Bhagwan Buddha, his Marathi book on Buddhism, was evidently known to Ambedkar, who took from it the de-mythicized version of the Buddha's home-leaving used in The Buddha and His Dhamma.

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cabinet, 19^7 - 1951, when he was most taken up with the affairs of newly independent India, saw several publications and journeys that reflected his interest in Buddhism.

The Untouchables, published in

I9I+8 , suggested a theory of the origin of untouchability in the facts that Untouchables may have been "Broken Men," fragments of tribes differing from the tribes settling into villages, and also Buddhists, retaining their faith (and eating beef) in the midst of Oo a rejuvenated Hinduism. • 3 In the same year, Ambedkar wrote a preface for and republished an early 20th century study of Buddhism, Lakshmi Narasu's The Essence of Buddhism.^

In the Vaisakha (Spring) issue

of the Maha Bodhi journal for 1950, Ambedkar wrote on the "Buddha and the Future of His Religion."

After a condemnation of Hinduism as

a religion founded neither on morality nor equality, he expressed an optimistic view of Buddhism's future in India. ' "The Hindu masses when they are enlightened are sure to turn to Buddhism," he wrote, adding that the attitude of Hindus who felt there was something wrong with their religion and yet did not denounce it openly would cause Hinduism to lapse, and the void would be filled with Buddhism. ended by listing three needs:

He

the production of a Buddhist Bible;

^Ambedkar, The Untouchables (New Delhi: Amrit Book Company, 1948). The idea that Untouchables or low castes were former Buddhists was earlier accepted by some members of other castes, chiefly the Koliyas of Rajasthan, the Ilavas of Travancore, the Namashudras and Dorns of Bengal. ®^P. Lakshmi Narasu, The Essence of Buddhism (1st. published 1907, 2nd. edition 1912, republished with a preface by B. R. Ambedkar by Thakker, Bombay, 19^8). Narasu was a associate of Pandit C. lyodhidoss who began the South India Sakya Association around 1900 in Madras. (Manuscript on "Fifty Years of Buddhist Activity in South India" in Ambedkar's files, Office of the Administrator General, Bombay.)

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-232the change of the degenerate present-day Sangha to a dedicated body of men, concerned with service and education; and the propagation of Buddhism by the Buddhist countries.®^

There is evidence that he was

at work on the first need, the "Buddhist Bible," in the same year that or he wrote the article. The year 1950 also saw the first Buddha Jayanti celebration, organized by members of the "Ambedkar School of Thought" in the grounds of the Scheduled Castes Welfare Association in Delhi.

The Burmese

ambassador to India, H. E. Maung Guy, presided, and Ambedkar spoke, noting that the Indian state flag and seal had found their symbolism in Buddhist culture.^ Shortly after the Jayanti, Ambedkar, his On wife, and P. II. Rajbhoj, the Chambhar who had earlier condemned the ®^B. R. Ambedkar, "The Buddha and the Future of His Religion," in The Maha Bodhi, Vaishaka Humber (April-May), 1950, Vol. 58. ^Letter from B. R. Ambedkar to Bhikshu Sangarakshita, 1950. Bhiks'nu Sangarakshita, a Buddhist of English birth, consulted with Ambedkar several times between 1950 and 1956, and has continued to make yearly tours among the Buddhists of Maharashtra and Gujarat. ^ Times of India, May 3, 1950. In a talk to the third World Buddhist Conference in 195^ in Burma, Ambedkar claimed that he had achieved several things in India for the propagation of Buddhism: provision for the study of Pali in the constitution, the inscription of a Buddhist aphorism on the face of Rashtripati Bhavan (the President’s House) in Delhi, the acceptance of the Ashokan wheel as the symbol of Independent India, and the public celebration of Buddha Jayanti as a holiday. Keer, Dr_. Ambedkar, pp. 178-^79. OO

Ambedkar's first wife, Ramabai, an uneducated Ratnagiri Mahar girl who had been married to him in 1903, died in 1935- In 19^+8, Ambedkar ill with diabetes and in need of someone to look after his health and household, married a Saraswat Brahman doctor, Sharda (Savita) Kabir. Her role as Ambedkar's companion and protector has been much criticized by Ambedkar's followers, but it is clear that she aided him in his study of Buddhism. She converted to Buddhism with him in 1956. Since his death, she has been active in work perpetuating his memory and in care for Tibetan refugees.

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-233conversion, accepted an invitation from the Young Men's Buddhist Association in Ceylon.

They journeyed to Colombo and Kandy to see

Buddhist ceremonies and rituals and to find out to what extent the religion of Buddhism "is preserved in its pristine purity, to what extent the religion of Buddhism is a live thing."°“ He addressed a group there on the rise and fall of Buddhism in India, claiming that although Buddhism in its material form had disappeared from India, it still existed as a spiritual force.

At a meeting in town hall, he

appealed to the Untouchables in Colombo to embrace Buddhism without having a separate organization.On his return from Ceylon, Ambedkar spoke at least twice on Buddhism in Bombay.

At a meeting

of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society in July, he denied the accusation of opportunism and said that he had been interested in Buddhism since childhood.^

In September, speaking in the Buddhist

temple at Worli, he declared that he would devote the rest of his life to the revival and spread of Buddhism.

92

Ambedkar's praises of Buddhism were often given in the context of a criticism of Hinduism, a practice which cast doubt, in the minds of many caste Hindus, on the sincerity of his commitment to Buddhism. While he was able to give a talk on parliamentary democracy with ®®The Times (Kandy), May 26, 1950. ^®Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, pp. i+19-120. ^•*~Times of India, July 26, 1950. 9^Times of India, October 1, 1950. I have been told by Buddhist converts that G. D. Birla built the Worli Buddhist temple in consulta­ tion with Ambedkar. It is much used by present-day Buddhists in Eombay. A Japanese Buddhist monk is in attendance there.

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little reference to the caste system or the disabilities of the Untouchable, he seemed incapable of speaking of religion without criticizing the Hinduism into which he had bepn born, exhibiting a degree of bitterness that might be termed not insincerity but a profound disappointment in something that touched his emotions.

There

is a personal quality about his writing, his trips to Buddhist countries, Ceylon in 1950, Burma in 195^, his study of Pali,

Q^

his

visits to the Buddhist caves of Maharashtra, not found in his earlier contacts with Christianity, Sikhism or Islam. Conversion to Buddhism Although Ambedkar spoke much on Buddhism after 1950, he did not attempt to place Buddhism before the village Mahar until 195^.

Mahars

in the small town of Dehu Road, most of them workers at the nearby ammunition depot, invited Ambedkar to dedicate a temple to Cokhamela in their community that year.

He responded by saying he would come

only if they would build a Buddhist Vihar.

They agreed, and Ambedkar

brought with him on the inauguration day a Bhikkhu to install a Buddha image before a crowd of some 20,000 people.

In his speech, he tied

together the traditions of Buddhism and of the lJ>th century Mahar poet-saint Cokhamela by saying that the image of god Vithoba of the ^Ambedkar, prevented from taking Sanskrit because of his caste in his school days, studied occasionally with a pandit in Bombay and in Delhi. In his later years, he began a study of Pali. Preliminary work for a Pali dictionary, evidently begun by Ambedkar and his wife, is filed with Ambedkar's papers in the offices of the Administrator General in Bombay. Pali is offered at Siddharth College of Arts and Sciences, and at other institutions in Maharashtra, and several Maharashtrian Buddhists have taken M.A.'s in Pali studies.

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Pandharpur sect, to which Cokhamela belonged, had derived from a Buddhist image.

IIo attempt at conversion was made, but the Vihar

stands, much in the shape of a Hindu temple because the Dehu Road Mahars did not know what a Buddhist Vihar should look like, as the first Buddhist structure in modern Maharashtra.^*1 The actual conversion did not take place until October, 1956. After considering holding the ceremony at Sarnath, and then at Bombay, Ambedkar decided on Nagpur, informing the leaders there of his decision only five weeks before the actual ceremony.

Waman

Godbole, a railroad employee and head of the Bharatiya Bouddha Jana Samiti (Indian Buddhist People’s Committee) which Ambedkar had founded a year before, sent out a call for would-be, converts to come to Nagpur on Dassara Day, dressed in clean, white garments.

Ambedkar

made careful arrangements for the oldest Bhikkhu in India, Mahasthaveer Chandramani,

to come to Nagpur to give him dlksha and corresponded

with D. Va,lasinha of the Maha Bodhi Society on the proper steps in a conversion ceremony, but he seems not to have invited the two Buddhist groups in India most closely tied in with the lower classes, the South Indian Buddhist Association of Madras^ an^ the Koliya Buddhist ^ Times of India, December 25* 195*+, and conversation on December 25, 1965, with Dchu Road Buddhists. The technical meaning of the word vihar is a residence for bhikkhus, but in Maharashtra it is the word used for a Buddhist place of worship. 95 The South India Buddhist Association, an organization of some fifty years standing, presented Ambedkar with a welcome address and a picture of Buddha during his Madras tour in 19*+*+. The Hindu (Madras), September 26, 19*+*+. N. Shivraj, President of the Republican Party at the time of his death in 1966, told me that his father was a Buddhist in Madras, evidently along with a number of other Scheduled Castes.

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Association of Ajmer in Rajasthan.

q6

The conversion days of October 14 and 15 saw Nagpur crowded with white-clad diksharthls, the majority of them Mahars, but with a handful

of others, coming for conversion.

A large field near the

Vaccine Institute on the outskirts of Nagpur was the scene of conver­ sion, and the crowd there on dlksha day approached half a million people.

Forty-five offices had been set up in the city to register

those converting, and 60,000 names were recorded in these, but all available figures give the actual number at the ceremonies at three to five lakhs. An observer wrote, "It seems Ambedkar has'turned Nagpur into another Pandharpur.

Such crowds I have never seen.

Ambedkar received conversion at the hands of the eighty-three year old Bhikkhu from Burma, and then administered the three refuges (tisarapa,) the five vows (papca slla) and twenty-four oaths of his own devising to the assembled multitudes.

The tisarapa is a Pali

chant known throughout the Theravada Buddhist countries:

I take

refuge in the Buddha; I take refuge in the Dhamma (law, faith, right morality,) I take refuge in the Sangha (the body of monks.) slla is also part of classical Buddhism:

The papca

I will attempt not to take

life, not to steal, not to lie, not to drink, to avoid wrongful sex. The twenty-four oaths combine an affirmation of Buddhism and a 9^The Koliya Buddhist Association of Ajmer, Rajasthan, was officially founded in 1952, according to its publication, Right View. The Koliyas claim to be "the Lord Buddha's own Blood-Related Republican Dynasty of Ancient India." Ambedkar was invited to preside at their Buddha Purnima functions in 1951 and 1955 but seems not to have been able to participate. ^"Nagpur Day by Day" in Nagpur Times, October 5, 1957-

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negation of Hinduism, and were made in Marathi, not Pali: Buddhist's Oaths 1. 2. 3. U. 5. 6. 7* 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13lU. 1516. 17. 18. 19.

20. 21. 22.

I will not regard Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh as Gods nor will I worship them. I will not regard Rama and Krishna as Gods nor will I worship them. I will not accept Hindu Dieties like Gauri, Ganapati etc. nor will I worship them. I do not believe that God has taken birth or incarnation in any form. I do not believe that Lord Buddha was the in­ carnation of Vishnu. I believe this propaganda as mischievous and false. I will never perform any Sharaaddha nor will I offer any Pinda. I will never act against the tenets of Buddhism. I will never get any Samskaar performed by Brahmins. I believe in the principle that all are equal.. I will try to establish equality. I will follow the Eight Fold Path of Lord Buddha. I will follow all the ten Paramitas of the Dhamma. I will have compassion on all living beings and will try to look after them. I will not lie. I will not commit theft. I will not indulge in lust or sexual Transgression. I will not take any liquor or drink that causes intoxication. I will try to mould my life in accordance with the Buddhist preachings, based on Enlightenment, Precept end Compassion. I embrace today the Bauddha Dhamma discarding the Hindu Religion which is detrimental to the emancipation of human beings and which believes in inequality and regards human beings other than Brahmins as low born. This is my firm belief that the Bauddha Dhamma is the best religion. I believe that today I am taking new-birth. I solemnly take oath that from today onwards I will act according to the Bauddha Dhamma.9°

^ Dhamma Deeksha (New Delhi: The Buddhist Society of India, n.d.) The oaths are reproduced here as they appear in this pamphlet in English.

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-233On the day following conversion, Ambedkar spoke, in simple and colorful Marathi, to the now converted Buddhists.

Nagpur was chosen

for conversion, he said, because it was the home of the Nags, a brave Buddhist people.

He spoke of the Mahars giving up the dragging out of

cattle and the eating of that meat in earlier days, and the criticism of caste Hindus of that improvement.

He contrasted the life of a

virtuous woman, living with dignity to the easier life of the prostitute, evidently making these points to urge his audience to sacrifice for self respect.

He quoted his own words at Yeola, "I will not die in the

Hindu religion," and added that today he felt as if he had left hell (and those nearest him said that he wept as he said this.) He spoke of his own hard life and his own achievements, and then, his words punctuated by applause, alternately praised Buddhism and criticized Hinduism.

The printed version of the two hour speech, which must be

greatly shortened, is rambling and personal, full of anecdotes of Mahar life, Ambedkar's past and the Buddha's teaching.

Nevertheless the idea

that Buddhism is a moral religion, a religion of equality, a religion respected by the world, comes across.

Ambedkar ended by charging the

Mahars not to bring Buddhism to a low state but to act with honor and respect, to observe Buddhism in the best way, thus saving themselves and their country.^9 Ambedkar died on December 6, 1956, within two months of the Nagpur conversion.

His cremation ceremony in Bombay was the occasion

of another conversion, administered to a lakh of people by Bhikkhu 99prabuddha Bharat (Marathi) October 27, 1956.

Translated

with the aid of Rekha Damle.

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-239-

An&nd Kausalyayan after the largest funeral procession Bombay had ever seen marched through the streets chanting Buddhagt Saranam GacchSmi (I take refuge in the Buddha.)

On December 16, crowds gathered for prayer

at the Diksha ground in Nagpur, and for conversion rites in Nasik and Bombay.

Conversion ceremonies were held across the face of Maharashtra

in the next two months.

The total number of declared Buddhists re­

corded in the 1961 census was 3*250,227 with 2,789,501 of that number in Maharashtra, encompassing some eighty percent of the Mahar caste. Of the three needs Ambedkar delineated as necessary for the revival of Buddhism in India - a Buddhist Bible, a dedicated body of monks, and support from Buddhist countries - Ambedkar fulfilled only one.

The Buddha and His Dhamma was published posthumously in 1957 by

the Peoples Education Society in Bombay. wrote it, in English.

It was printed as Ambedkar

A Hindi version, translated by Bhikshu Anand

Kausalyayan, appeared in 1961.'*'^'*' A translation in Marathi has not yet been published.

The Buddha and His Dhamma is based chiefly on

Pali sources, although some changes and the removal of the miraculous and the idea of reincarnation slants the material toward a definition of Buddhism solely as an ethical, rational, and humanitarian reli­ gion.102

In addition to this guide, Ambedkar left an outline for the

100Censu8 of India, Paper No. 1_of 1963, 1961 Census - Religion (New Delhi, 19^3".) (see maps II and III) Anand Kausalyayan, Bhagwan Buddha Aur Unka Dharm (Bombay: Siddharth Prakashan, 1961) 10^Ambedkar made extensive but selective use of the Buddhist Pali scriptures and the Buddhacarita of Ashvaghosa. A study of Ambed­ kar's sources and interpretation is found in The Use of Buddhist Scriptures in Dr_. B_. R_. Ambedkar's The Buddha and His Dhamma, by Adele M. Fiske (M.A. thesis, Columbia University, 1966).

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-21+0-

conversion rite and for a simple wedding ceremony.

His previous

celebrations of Buddha Jayanti left that tradition to be used as a substitute for Hindu holy days by the new Buddhists.

He also had

introduced Pali and the study of Buddhism into his colleges, and the Pali

tisarana and paftca sTla became an established part of any new

Buddhist ceremony, with the panca sila also functioning as a brief guide to Buddhist morality. Highly critical of the contemporary Buddhist sangha, Ambedkar made little effort to create a body of Bhikkhus among the Mahars.

The

leadership of the conversion movement after his death devolved upon the political leaders, the only group with any sort of structure or public reputation.

His stress on the study of Buddhism, however, has

produced local leaders, many of them college students or government servants, who conduct ceremonies, interpret Buddhist beliefs, hold meetings, and occasionally conduct pilgrimages or translate Buddhist writings into Marathi.

Ambedkar did secure land in Banglore with the

intention of establishing a Buddhist seminary there,-^3 but these plans did not come to fruition.

The Buddhist Society of India, now headed

by Ambedkar's son, Yeshvant Ambedkar, serves as the oft.cial organiza­ tion for the new Buddhists, but it is ineffective on the local level except where there is strong leadership j.n "tiis area itself. Ambedkar was conscious of a need for support from the Asian Buddhist countries.

After independence, India herself became much

more aware of the neighboring Buddhist countries, and the all-India celebration of the 2500 anniversary of Buddhism in India in 1°56, the -t-Q^Times of India, January 12, 1955.

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-2141-

same year as Ambedkar's conversion, was indicative of this awakened interest.

Ambedkar visited Burma, Ceylor and Nepal, although at

Katmandu he was too ill to inspect Buddhism in Nepal or to participate fully in the fourth Conference of the World Fellowship of Buddhists. He did give a lecture, however, three weeks before his death, on "Buddhism and Communism," stressing Buddhism as a better way to peace and justice than Communism for all of Asia.1C,1+ Ambedkar made no firm arrangements for continuing help from the Buddhist countries, however. Bhikkhus from Thailand, Burma, Ceylon, Tibet and Japan do travel among new Buddhist groups in Maharashtra and elsewhere, supplying at least an image of Indian Buddhist connection with a world religion. effectiveness, however, is generally limited by language.

Their

A

consciousness among Maharashtrian Buddhists of identification with world-wide Buddhism remains, but no institutionalized channel of support from other Buddhist countries has been created. ^^The speech, given November 20, 1956, at the fourth conference of the World Fellowship of Buddhists at Katmandu, has been published in a pamphlet, Buddha and Karl Marx (Nagpur: M. D. Panchbhai, 1965).

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CHAPTER V

POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT, 1935 - 1956 Just as the conversion announcement of 1935 marked a new direction in the religious aspect of the Mahar movement, Ambedkar's announcement in 1936 that he would found a political party gave a new impetus to the political movement.

The decision of the Mahar

Conference in 1936 that conversion from Hinduism was "the only remedy for the Mahar community to attain equality and freedom"1 called a halt to attempts to claim temple entry and other religious rights within Hinduism.

But the conversion itself was delayed for

twenty years and the energy and organization that had gone into the religious struggle was given to the new opportunities opened up by full political representation and the establishment of a political party to work for "equality and freedom" by political means. Political activity was, of course, not new to the Mahars. From the 1890's on, their political efforts had involved petitioning government for redress of grievances or new privileges.

In 1921

a more direct political activity was added to the practice of petition.

Depressed Class members began to participate in the

political processes as nominated representatives on legislative xThe Depressed Classes (St. Mary:s), p. 107.

-2h2-

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-2^3bodies.

The Government of India Act of 1935, however, brought into

law a new principle.

The Depressed Classes, now called Scheduled

Castes, were to be represented according to their percentage of the population in s^ats reserved especially for them, rather than by a token number of nominees.

The increased number of representatives

and the fact of direct election made possible a broader kind of political activity.

It also made necessary a new kind of political

organization, if candidates representative of the Mahars' ambitions were to be elected to the rrovincial legislature in the coming 1937 elections and were to fu-ction unitedly in that legislature. The announcement of the neu party founded by B. R. Ambedkar, the Independent Labour Party, first appeared in the Times of India on August 15, 1936, two months after the Mahar Conference on conversion. The spirit of the two moves is much the same —

independent, separatist,

intolerant of patronage, determined to build new structures outside the old ways.

In only one way, however, were the conversion announcement

and the response to new political rights intertwined.

The hard won

privilege of reserved seats for Scheduled Castes in legislative bodies was not to be lost through conversion!

The assurance of this was the

only reference to politics made by Ambedkar at the Bombay Mahar con­ ference of 1936:

"Neither any fear need be entertained about our

political privileges [after conversion], since they will follow us p wherever we shall go." The political platform of the Independent Labour Party, announced two months later, made no reference at all to religion. p The Depressed Classes (St. Mary's), p. 105.

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For Ambedkar, the acknowledgment of the right of the Depressed Classes to fall scale representation, made in the Government of India Act of 1935 and soon to be realized in the election of 1937, was the achievement of a long struggle.

He had not only petitioned government

for this recognition, he had been bound up personally in most of the commissions and committees that considered the Reforms since 1917. And in an even more personal way, he had confronted Gandhi on the question during the Epic Fast of 1932, so that the final molding of the right of special Depressed Class representation had been in his hands.

The scheme for Depressed Class representation, which involved

primary elections within the community preceding the general election, was not completely to Ambedkar's liking, but the securing of Depressed Class political rights in a period of fifteen years was such a triumph that Ambedkar entered the election battle of 1937 full of confidence in his political power and the democratic method. The party Ambedkar founded at this moment of political confid­ ence was the*Tirit of~three, all of them based on the principle that the special interests of the Untouchables would be best served by a separate organization, an identity distinct from Congress or any other established political organization.

The model was that of

another minority community, the Muslims, and the fear of submersion, of losing the recognition of special identity and special needs was very similar to that of the Muslims in areas where Muslims were a minority.

The path of the Untouchables, however, was separate from

that of the Muslims.

Except in local and special circumstances,

the Muslim League and Ambedkar's parties went different ways, both in

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-2U5-

conflict with Congress, each attempting to use political means to guarantee the rights and privileges of their minority group. Although the basis and the chief strength of each of Ambedkar's parties was the Mahar caste, none of the three was confined to that caste.

The first party, the Independent Labour Party, was intended

to become a workers' political alliance.

The second, the Scheduled

Castes Federation founded in 19^2, was an effort to draw together Scheduled Castes all over India in a united attempt to win recognition as a political minority from the British before the granting of independence.

The third, the Republican Party, was planned to bring

the Scheduled Tribes and the other Backward Castes into the Scheduled Castes movement to form a large political bloc of all the uncte'ir^ privileged.

In no case did the political party fulfill its aim.

Each

party, however, was successful enough in politicizing the masses, in electing a limited number of candidates, in serving as a political voice for the Scheduled Castes, in using political leverage, and in keeping the needs of the Scheduled Castes before the general public, so that the idea of a separatist party has continued to be an article of faith among Ambedkar's followers. The Independent Labour Party According to the Times of India announcement, Dr. Ambedkar's original intention was "to organise a party exclusive/.y of the Depressed ■a Classes...but at the desire of his friends from other classes, he has ^The friends noted in the newspaper article caste Hindu friends, chiefly from the Chandraseniya (C.K.P.) caste, who gathered around Ambedkar at the School during the 1930's. They provided Ambedkar's

were the circle of Kayastha Prabhu R. M. Bhatt High sounding board for

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-2U6consented to give a general name to the party and has worded the

% IjV

programme in more general terms...The nucleus of the Party would ^p^flll "be the fifteen members of the Depressed Classes [the fifteen reserved seats for Scheduled Castes in the Bombay Legislature]. But members of the other classes were free to join the Party.

Dr.

Ambedkar added that the Depressed Classes possessed large voting strength in constituencies in which no seat was reserved for them, and it would be possible for them to place that voting strength at the disposal of any candidate who cared to become a member of the party = The name of the Independent Labour Party reveals both Ambedkar's attachment to the British system of parliamentary democracy and his hope that the party would be more than a Scheduled Caste group. The program of the new party was socialist in flavor and its aim was "mainly to advance the welfare of the labouring classes."

The

Party intended to work within the framework of the new Constitution although it recognized that it was "full of defects and falls much short of full responsible Government" and although it objected to the institution of the second chamber which had been established in some of the provincial governments. According to its platform, the Independent Labour Party accepted "the principle of State management and State ownership ideas and also the intellectual companionship that the Mahars were not yet capable of giving. D. V. Pradhan, a C.K.P. who had worked with Ambedkar in the Municipal Kamgar Union, was Secretary of the Independent Labour Party. ^Times of India, August 15, 1936. The Times news release was printed as a publicity booklet by the Independent Labour Party.

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-2h7-

of industry whenever it may become necessary in the interests of the people."

The party announced it would undertake to establish

Land Mortgage Banks, agriculturist producers' cooperative and marketing societies and to avoid fragmentation of land.

Tenants

under the Khoti and Talukdari land rent systems in Ratnagiri and Gujarat would be protected.

Industry would be rehabilitated and

promoted to drain off the excess population of the land; technical education would be stressed.

Standard liberal provisions for

industrial workers were guaranteed, and unemployment would be relieved by schemes of land settlement and public works.

The tax

system wouid be reformed, especially since "the present system of taxation is unjust and weighs heavily on the poorer sections of , the population" but reduction of taxes in toto was not feasible. Legislation regarding money lenders, house rents in cities, beggars, and village planning "in order to modernise the outlook of the villager and to make him a progressive person" would be undertaken. Schemes for free and compulsory primary education, adult education and technical education would be brought forward, and university education would be reorganized on a regional basis, establishing teaching universities to remedy "the curse of examination which has blasted the intelligence and effort of the student population." In addition to pledging good administration, the Party would endeavor to secure the separation of the judiciary from the executive.

It

would also seek to amend the watan system in a way suited to modern conditions. The welfare of the Scheduled Castes occupies little space as

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a separate item in the party program. Two of the items included in the concern for the general welfaredetailed above had long been part of the Mahar demands - compulsory primary education and reform of the watan land system.

Added to these were three para­

graphs that.contain direct references to social matters in terms of caste:

"The Party will endeavour to remove all obstacles to

free and full life and to alter, amend

or abolish any economic

system which is unjust to any class orsection of the people." "The Party will undertake legislation for the advancement of all necessary social reform (i) to prevent social reformers from being outcasted by the orthodox (ii) to penalise all forms of organised attempts at direct action such as terroism and boycott to prevent individuals or classes from exercising the rights and liberties given to them by law."

"The Party will also endeavour to prevent the administra­

tion from becoming the monopoly of any single caste or community. Consistent with efficiency of administration the Party will endeavour to bring about a fair admixture of all castes and communities in the administration of the Presidency." Social matters in the platform were worded in the broadest possible terms, perhaps in an effort to attract any liberal who was not committed to Congress.

No intention of endeavoring to

legislate against untouchability was announced.

There was,

probably because of the religious conversion, nothing about temple entry.

Guaranteed places for Scheduled Castes in police

and administration were not mentioned.

Nor was there any pledge

concerning prohibition, which evidently by this time was felt to

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-2 U 9 -

be a matter of internal reform. The platform of the Independent Labour Party shows, more clearly than any other document, Ambedkar's realization that the needs of the Depressed Classes were in the economic as well as the social and religious fields.

The changing of the watan system from baluta

(gifts in kind) for the village servant to cash payments for specific services rendered had been a long-standing demand of the Ambedkar leadership group.

The watan system was unacceptable psychologically,

because it defined the Mahar as inferior, but also economically, because it held the Mahar to an unprofitable position in the village and discouraged his movement to industry and urban centers.

But

reformation of the watan-system alone would have little effect on the economic situation of the village Mahar whose basic support was wages earned as agricultural laborer.

Banks and cooperatives, land

settlement and public works for those who stayed on the land, new industrial opportunities and technical training for those pushed or pulled from the village, were additional planks designed to deal with the lower class, ncn-land-owning agricultural worker.

The program

was ambitious but not as radical as Ambedkar's later endorsement of nationalization of the land and separate settlements for the Scheduled Castes. The Independent Party put up candidates for fourteen of the fifteen seats reserved in the Bombay Legislature for Scheduled Castes.

At least four caste Hindus ran on the Party's ticket for

general seats, and perhaps ten more were given support at various times during the campaign in Ambedkar's newspaper, Janata. The Party

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-250von eleven reserved seats.^

Congress captured four:

two in the

Gujarat area of Bombay province, one in Bombay forth and SubDistrict , and one in Kolaba District, the area where the 1927 Mahad satyagraha had taken place.

The general seat in Kolaba area,

contested by Surendranath G. Tipnis, of Mahad, one of the originators of the satyagraha, was also lost.

Three caste Hindus were returned on

the Independent Labour Party ticket, a Saraswat Brahman from South Ratnagiri, and C.K.P.’s (Prabhus or Kayasths) from East Poona and North Ratnagiri.

The election records show that only in two districts,

North Satara and North Bijapur, were Scheduled Caste primary elections held, and that in most constituencies, far fewer people voted for the reserved seat candidate than for the general se*>t. The Independent Labour Party's chief campaign was in Bombay ^There is some confusion about the actual winning Independent Labour Party members since the Return Showing the Results of Elections in India, presented by the Secretary of State for India to Parliament TNew Delhi: Government of India, 1937) lists party but not name of candidates, and Ambedkar himself in What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables gives two varying figures. The Return shows ten Independent Labour Party candidates for reserved seats returned. I have added one to this number because K. S. Savant, who stood for the North Satara reserved seat on the I.L.P. ticket is listed as a member of the Assembly, although the seat is shown in the Return as "Independent." ^Return Showing the Results of Elections in India .(1937), pp. 28-33. Since constituencies were plural member, i.e. one general seat, one for a Scheduled Caste candidate, it would seem that many Hindus voted for only the general seat. Scheduled Caste voting lists had been increased by lowering qualifications. Any Scheduled Caste member who was literate or who had in the previous year performed the duties of an inferior village office was qualified for the electoral roll. See Government of India Bill. Instruments of Instructions to the Governor General and Governors. Cmd. 1*605. (London: H.M.S.O., 1935), p* 259-

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Province, although shortly before the election recognition was given in Janata that allied candidates were standing for election in Central Provinces and Berar.

In this area, Congress contested

nine out of the nineteen reserved seats and won five.

The

Independent Labour Party won four.^ Although at least two Independent Labour Party ticket holders for the reserved seats were not Mahars (one was a Gujarati Scheduled Caste, one a Mang), the great majority of those elected were from the Mahar caste.

Candidates such as R. R. Bhole (Poona) and D. G.

Jadhav (Kandesh) represented the new college-trained generation of Mahars.

Others such as B. K. Gaikwad (Nasik) and P. J. Roham

(Ahmadnagar) were less well educated but English-speaking men known for their educational and social work within the caste. There was no Chsmbhar selected as a candidate, an ommission that both marked their lack of participation in previous Ambedkar activities and solidified their position as supporters of Congress in future political, affairs. S-N.Shivtarkar, Secretary of Ambedkar’s Bahishkrit Hirikarini Sabha until the mid-thirties and a Chambhar, reports that Ambedkar refused to select candidates from the Chambhar caste because of their non-participation in the movement, and that he himself resigned from the Sabha over this issue.

The candidate opposing Ambedkar from Bombay

(Byculla and Parel constituency) in the election was the well-known 7Indian Annual Register, 1937, Vol. II, p. l68(n). In the official Return the Ambedkarites are shown as winning three seats: wagpur-Kamti, Chanda-Brahmapuri, and Yeotmal-Dharwha. In both documents, the terms "Ambedkar's Party" or "Ambedkarites" are used rather than Independent Labour Party.

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-252Q Chambhar cricket player and Congress supporter, P. Balu.

Ambedkar's

victory over him may have sustained the Mahars' conviction that they would prevail without actively soliciting Chambhar support.

A

Chambhar, P. N. Rajbhoj, was later to be Secretary of Ambeakar's second political party, but as a group the Chambhars from this time on were committed to Congress. The distribution of tickets also alienated some hopeful Mahars.

This seems to be the point at which Shivram Janba Kamble,

the veteran Poona leader, left Ambedkar's camp.

Several, able Mahars

in the Nasik area, led by Mr. Rankambe, also disassociated themselves from Ambedkar's party at this time but were unable to form a viable separate political group. The Independent Labour Party took its place in the Bombay Provincial Assembly in 1937 along with Congress, the Non-Brahmin Party, the Democratic Swaraj Party, the Varnashram Party, the Khoti Sabha, the Muslim League and various independents.

It was second only

to the Muslim League in numbers among opposition parties.

The Indian

National. Congress had won 85 of the 175 seats, and formed the ministry with B. G. Kher as chief minister.

Although B. G. Kher had taken part

in the Nasik Satyagraha, there was little cooperation in the Assembly between Congress and the Independent Labour Party.

Using his experience

O °Ambedkar had written the man-patra (welcome address, or literally, letter of respect) fo.• Balu Babaji Palvankar, known as P. Balu, upon his return from a cricket tour in England nearly twenty years earlier, and had had some part in P. Balu's selection as a Depressed Class nominee on the Bombay Municipal Corporation in the early 1920's, but Balu supported Gandhi and joint electorates during the Round Table Conference, and stood for election on the Congress ticket in 1937-

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in the Bombay Legislative Assembly in later years to make a point about the necessity in a true democracy for the majority not to tyrannize over the minority, Dr. Ambedkar said, "When I was a member of the Bombay Legislative Assembly, there were a few of our friends, Mr. Morarji, Mr. Munshi and Mr. Kher and others who were in office. They never allowed a single motion of adjournment to be discussed. Either our friend Mr. Mavlankar who was then the speaker helped them by ruling it out or as he admitted, the Minister objected to it."9 During its short working lifetime, from 1937 to 1939, when the Congress ministries resigned, the Independent Labour Party functioned with vigor but little effect in the Congress-dominated Bombay Legislature.

Ambedkar protested the minimum salary proposed

for ministers, which he felt was impractical idealism.

He also

rose to protest the Budget in February, 1938, calling it a retrograde budget, providing for the rich and not for the poor, a budget in which certain items called for a Blank Check from the Legislature since they concerned matters (education, voluntary police force, village panchayats, labour amenities) not discussed in the House. Independent Labour Party members also protested the Wardha Scheme of Education, the increased powers of the city police in matters 9Pr. Ambedkar on Parliamentary Democracy (Poona: District Law Library Address, 1952), p. 17-

Poona

^ Bombay Legislative Assembly Debates, Vol. Ill, Part I, February-March, 1938, pp. 168-179-

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-2 5 U -

other then riots, and the use of the word Hari.1°n in a Local Boards Act.

The education of Scheduled Caste students, the

problems of Scheduled Caste teachers, the lack, of adequate vater supplies for Untouchables ( R. R. Bhole suggested the entire budget of ten lakhs for vater supply be spent for Scheduled Castes water provisionsand the need to abolish the vatan system were matters related directly to the Scheduled Castes that were raised at various times.

The Independent Labour Party member from Ratnagiri, G. V.

Parulekar, a caste Hindu, was one of the most vocal members of the Party on the floor of the house, particularly in criticising the Government's agricultural and labor policies.

*1 O

The Harijan Temple

Entry Bill sponsored by Congress passed evidently without comment by Independent Labour Party members, although Orthodox Hindus protested outside the Council House. 13 Protests in the Legislature were combined with extraparliamentary activity in the case of two bills, and the support given in the streets may be taken to indicate general Mahar approval of the Party's actions.

There was a march of peasants in Bombay city in 1938

to protest against khoti, a revenue-farming system in Ratnagiri and ^ Indian Annual Register, 1937, Vol. II, p. 183. 12

G. V. Parulekar later became a Communist, and seems to have been associated with Ambedkar only during the 1937-1939 Legislative Assembly period. ^ Indian Annual Register, 1938, Vol. I, p. 1^3- G. S. Gupte in "Legislation for the Improvement of the Lot of 'Depressed Classes' or 'Karijans' in Social .Reform Annual (Bombay Presidency Social Reform Association, 1939)» reviews temple entry legislation and discusses the 1938 Bombay Harijan Temple Worship Bill as a rather timid piece of "enabling" legislature.

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Kolaba which Ambedkar worked to abolish, and evidently not only Mahars but the chief sufferers under the system, the tenant Kunbis, followed Ambedkar's leadership in this.

The Khoti Abolition Bill sponsored by

Ambedkar however was opposed by Congress on the grounds that the Revenue Minister had promised to introduce legislation in the matter.^ A one day strike was held November 7, 1938, to protest the Industrial Disputes Bill, which Ambedkar called "a bad, bloody and a brutal bill," and "the Workers’ Civil Liberties Suspension Act."^

Although the

strike, in which Communists joined, was considered by the Party to be a success, the Industrial Disputes Bill was passed by the legislature. While the Independent Labour Party did not confine its legislative efforts to matters concerning Untouchables, it failed to secure a base among caste Hindu workers.

The Depressed Class

origin of the party worked against this, as did the strength of Congress and its identification with the Independence Movement. A talk given by Ambedkar to ^Depressed Class railroad workers in 1930 illustrates his dilemma.

He was against capitalism, and for

effective organization of the workers, but he was also against /

"brahmanism," and this justified a separate union for Untouchable workers within the labor union movement.

While Ambedkar did not

attempt to form a union at that time, he did stress the need of Untouchables to give support to the Independent Labour Party in ^ Indian Annual Register, 1937, Vol. II, p. 188. The Khoti Abolition Act was finally passed in 19^9- See Govindlal D. Patel, Agrarian Reforms in Bombay (Bombay: G. D. Patel, 1950), pp. 100-1U2. ^See debate in Bombay Legislative Assembly Debates, Vol. IV, . 1938, pp. 1330-1359.

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-256preference to any other political organization.1^ The same sort of commitment was demanded of any who supported the Independent Labour Party, not only acceptance of its socialist principles but whole­ hearted support for the social and political demands of the Untouch­ ables themselves.

Few but Untouchables, caste Hindu, reformers

dissatisfied with the policies of Congress, and perhaps an opportunist or two who could secure a seat in the legislature in this way and no other, were interested in making such a commitment. The resignation of Congress from the provincial ministries in protest against the Government's declaration of war without consulta­ tion with Indians, brought an end to political activity.

Ambedkar

celebrated the end of Congress Rule by appearing with M. A. Jinnah at a function held in a Muslim locality in Bombay on December 22, 1939* The "Day of Deliverance" was hailed by Ambedkar, according to reports, in flawless U cLu• Sect while Jinnali went on to

s e c u re

the hold of the

Muslim League on the Muslim peoples of the sub-continent during the period of Congress protest and its subsequent inactivity after the 19^+2 arrests, Ambedkar let mass politics lapse during the early war period.

He continued to address large groups of Mahars and other

Scheduled Castes.

A Conference on Watan which included Mahars, Mangs

and Vethias met at Haregaon, near Ahmadnagar in December, 1939, drawing 20,000 attenders.1^

In March, 19*+0, 10,000 people met at Mahad to

R. Ambedkar, Presidential Address to G.I.P. Rly. Depressed Class Workmen's Conference, Manmad, dist. Nasik, 12th and 13th February, 1938 (privately printed.) ^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 328.

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celebrate the anniversary of the Mahad Satyagraha as "Independence 1C

Day."

But Ambedkar's genius was in attracting the masses and in

dealing with Government officials at a high level, not in constructing an organization which would practical identity.

hold together a large

political reasons rather than out of an

group of peoplefor emotional senseof

Ambedkar's ability to attract a large mass following among

the Mahars probably is the reason for Hugh Tinker's statement that Dr. Ambedkar "may be seen as a prototype of proletarian politics of ip the future. ^ Ambedkar, however, was not equipped with the necessary temperament to build the kind of organization this statement implies. His biographer, Dhananjay Keer, has captured his method of leadership: "Ambedkar did not try to organize his political party on modern lines. He had no taste for individual organization. There were no regular annual conferences or general meetings of the organiza­ tions with which he was connected. Where and when he sat wasthe venue of conference and the time for decision...When he ranted hispeople to assemble under his banner, he simply gave them a clarion call and the organization sprang up like the crop in the rainy season. In the summer there would be nothing in the field, the OD banner resting in his study corner and the people at.home. u The Scheduled Castes Federation Ambedkar made one attempt during the War years to build an organization, but it was on the old pattern of issuing a clarion call, not a careful structuring of the many dissident Scheduled Castes ^ Times of India, March 21, 19U0. York:

-^Hugh Tinker, India and Pakistan, A Political Analysis (New Frederick A. Praeger, 1962), p. 201. ^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. ^77*

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groups, such as the Ad-Dharmas in the North,

21

into a political unit.

In July of 19^2, an All-India Depressed Classes Conference, evidently the first since its meeting in 1930, was held at Nagpur.

The meetings

were attended, according to one report, by 70,000 people, with rep­ resentatives from Bengal, Bombay, Punjab, the Central Provinces and Berar, and the United Provinces. was in the presidential chair. predominated.

Rao Bahadur N. Shivraj from Madras Mahars, however, undoubtedly

The meeting had been called to provide tangible backing

for Ambedkar's views on the Cripps Mission, and its first resolution condemned the proposals of His Majesty's Government regarding constitutional change, as brought to India by Sir Stafford Cripps, as a betrayal of the interests of the Scheduled Castes and a breach of the assurances given them that a constitution would not be imposed upon them without their consent. Further resolutions re-stated the demands that had been part of the Scheduled Caste political activity in some form since the earliest days of the movement: sums for primary and advanced education for the Scheduled Castes, representation in the public services and all legislative bodies, and separate electorates. The two final resolutions of this 19^2 conference were of a new kind.

"After long and mature deliberation," the conference came

"to the conclusion that a radical change must be made in the village The 1931 Census reports that 1+00,000 people in Punjab returned themselves as Ad-Dharm, with concentrations in Jullundur and Hoshiarpur Districts, While not all Ad-Dharmas were Scheduled Caste, all belonged to some depressed group. Khan Ahmad Hasan Khan, Census of India, 1931, Volume XVII, Punjab, Part I, Report (Lahore: Government of India, 1933) p. 295, 310. While Ambedkar does have a number of followers in Jullundur, there is no evidence that he attempted to organize this group, or the equally restive Jatavs in Agra, as a structural part of his political movement.

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system, now prevalent in India and which is the parent of all the ills from which the Scheduled Castes are suffering for many centuries at the hands of the Hindus." The resolution continued to ask for a constitutional provision for transfer of Scheduled Castes to separate Scheduled Caste villages, "away from and independent of Hindu villages."

The final, resolution established a political party

for the purpose of carrying on the political movement of the Scheduled Castes, to be called the Scheduled Castes Federation.

22

It is difficult to say how much the separate village resolution reflected the mind of the village Mahar, how much it indicated a further step in Ambedkar’s search for an economic resolution of the problems of the Untouchables, or how much it was simply an attempt to establish the desperate seriousness of Scheduled Caste political demands.

Ambedkar as early as 1926 had suggested at a

meeting in Jejuri (southern Poona District) that Untouchables seek lard for colonization,c- and at a conference in 1929 in Ratnagiri district he had said he would try to secure land for cultivation in Sind and in Indore State for Untouchables.

0 ]i

The following

year, a recommendation of the Starte Committee, of which Ambedkar was a member, stated:

"We also consider it possible that some of

the Depressed Classes would take up land in Sind if a suitable scheme could be worked out by the Barrage Revenue authorities in 22

Report of Depressed Class Conferences (Nagpur: Meshram, 19^2).

G. T.

2^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 63. ^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 127.

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consultation with the Backward Classes officer."2'’ The donation of land and new village sites had been part of the Madras Government program to aid the Depressed Classes

and separate settlements

in the Malabar area had been undertaken on behalf of the lower castes.

27

In the North, the impulse for separation from caste Hindus

came from the Untouchables themselves.

Writing in the late 1930's,

Sir Edward Blunt reported, "The Untouchables, for obvious reasons, are incessantly petitioning the State for leave to establish a hamlet 28 of their own at a distance." But provincial governments outside the South did not intervene in settlement patterns. The idea of separate villages or new colonies propounded by the Scheduled Castes Federation met with little response, however, from British officials, and the resolution of the 19^2 Nagpur confer­ ence served chiefly to underwrite the increasingly vocal Mahar demands for separate electorates.

The Muslim League's demand for Pakistan,

first made in 19^0, occupied the attention of both Congress and the ^ Report 0f the Depressed Classes and Aboriginal Tribes Committee (Starte Committee), p. U2. 26 By 1937-38, the Madras Government had assigned 117,79^ acres of land to the Depressed Classes. Madras Administration 1937-38 (Madras: 1939), p- 1^1^Cochin State by 1933 had established Ul colonies of 1640 Depressed Class families on new land. Census of India,1931,Vol. XXI, Cochin, (Ernakulam: Cochin Government Press, 1933), p. 293. See also Census of India, 1931, Vol. XXVIII, Travascore, Part I, Report^ p. 433-4. 2®Edward Blunt, Social Service in India (London: H.M.S.O., 1939)* P* 81. Blunt also notes the insistence on leadership from their own rsnRs sc marked in the Mahar movement: "If is worth remembering that, as more than one of their leaders has made plain, they do not wish to be raised by others, but to raise themselves." Page 68.

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British, and the early Cripps proposals seemed to overlook the problems of the Scheduled Castes in the anxiety of healing the HinduMusiim rift and carrying on with the war.

M. R. Jayakar, a Bombay

Liberal, had written to his fellow moderate, Tej Bahadur Sapru, over a year before the Nagpur Conference:

"The Depressed Classes, under

Ambedkar’s guidance, are becoming more conscious of their separateness and not of their unity with Hinduism and perhaps in a short time a cry will go up for Mahar-stan. The new political party formed by the Nagpur conference carried in its name, the All-India Scheduled Castes Federation, a claim to separation from both Congress and caste Hindus.

Its chief function

was to demand separate electorates for Scheduled Castes, returning to the position most politically-conscious Untouchable leaders had held in the years before the Poona Pact of 1932.

As the time of

independence came nearer, Scheduled Castes again tried to secure recognition of their special political needs from the British. Even M. C. Rajah, Ambedkar's opponent among the Depressed Class leaders during the Poona Pact days, joined Ambedkar in a demand for separate electorates, although he did not join in the formation of the Scheduled Castes Federation. The 19L2 All India Depressed Class conference not only created a new political party, but served as an opportunity for the Scheduled Castes to look at the progress they had made. 29Jayakar to Sapru, April 7, 19^1. Collection, National Library, Calcutta.

Ambedkar congratulated

Letter # J 65 in the Sapru

30lCeer, Dr. Ambedkar, p. 3^0.

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his audience in Nagpur on the political awareness they now possessed, contrasting it with the apathy he had seen at the beginning of his public campaigns twenty years before.

He noted that good progress

had been made in education, and that entry into the police and the army had been secured, and added, "The greatest progress that we have made is to be found among our women folk.

Here you see in

this conference these 20 to 25 thousand women present. dress, observe their manners, mark their speech.

See their

Can any one

say that they are Untouchable women? "3-1Although the new party was organized in 19^+2, Ambedkar did little to prepare for the elections of 19^6.

The period between the

end of his service in the provincial legislature in late 1939 and the election of 19U6 was filled not with political activity, but with writing; with attempts to secure political benefits, particularly separate electorates, at the highest level of government; and with the kind of government service that drew out all his qualities of statesmanship and only incidentally was of benefit to the Depressed Classes. on

In 19^0, Ambedkar published Thoughts on Pakistan,

a defense

of the idea of a separate Muslim nation on the grounds that Muslims in India, despite their similarities to their Hindu neighbors in each province, were emotionally a nation, and on the grounds that such a dissident faction had better be excluded from independent • ^Report of Depressed Class Conferences, 19^2, pp. 28-29. Ambedkar, Thoughts on Pakistan (Bombay: Thacker and Co., 19^0). A second edition was published as Pakistan or The Partition of India in 19^5 and a third in 19^6.

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-263India, lest it prove a divisive factor in the new democracy.

The

book reveals an understanding of the Muslim demand for Pakistan which indicates that Untouchables and Muslims shared a sense of separateness, of isolation, of their rights being ignored by the Hindu majority.

It also exhibits a critical attitude which makes

the reader doubt that Ambedkar ever seriously considered converting to Islam. In July, 19^1 , Ambedkar became a. member of the National Defense Council, and in June, 19^2. he was appointed to the Viceroy's Executive Council as Member for labour, the first Untouchable to hold such a high post.

His acceptance took him to Delhi, where he

from then on maintained a home until his death.

Although he

returned to Bombay province for occasional meetings, and made a tour of Calcutta, Hyderabad and Madras in 19^ during which various Depressed Class groups presented him with addresses, it is clear that his chief energies went into governmental matters.

While

he guarded himself against giving specific favors to Scheduled Caste people, he tried to secure measures that would aid that group permanently.

A letter to B. K. Gaikvad expresses his position:

There are things which I can do, there are things which I can't do and there are things which I won't do. You know my 3^a speech given on the birth anniversary of Mahadeo Govind Ranade in Poona on January 19, 19^3, contrasts Ranade's statesmanship and liberalism with Gandhi's and Jinnah's "colossal egotism," and adds to the doubt that Ambedkar could ever have worked happily within the Muslim political movement. B. R. Ambedkar, Ranade, Gandhi and Jinnah (Bombay: Thacke ', 19^3■ Reprinted by Bheem Patrika Publica­ tions, Jullundar City, Panjab, 19^5.)

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nature, how hard it is...I am responsible for creating opportunities for our boys. But I don't think it is necessary or obligatory on you or me to take up the cause of any particular boy. One of the things which he felt he could do was give effect to the fifty year old demand of the Depressed Classes for re-admittance into the army.

Sanction was given for Mahar battalions while he was

on the National Defence Council, and after he became a member of the Executive Council, permanent arrangements were made for the present OC Mahar regiment. J In November, 19^3, before an audience of New Delhi Scheduled Caste people, he listed the things he had been able to do for them:

8 1/3 per cent reserved appointments in Government posts,

reserved seats for technical education of Depressed Class students in ^ Letter to Ef. K. Gaikwad, July 2 b t 19^3, New Delhi. Another letter, dated August 9> 19^2, New Delhi, indicates that Ambedkar did seek to involve those who had been working with him in high level conferences: "I am determined to help our people in every way I can during the tenure of my office. I have already given a start by inviting Donde [a C.K.P. educator and labor leader] and Bhole [a Mahar lawyer and Independent Labour Party member of the Bombay legislature, 1937-39] as delegates to the Labour Conference which was recently held in New Delhi under my chairmanship. Such a thing has never happened before." (Both letters are in the possession of B. K. (Dadasaheb) Gaikwad.) ■^A report to the U.S. government from Delhi indicates that Wavell requested Ambedkar's assistance in recruiting three battalions from the Depressed Classes. Ambedkar agreed, with two provisions: the battalions were not to be disbanded after the war; there were to be no caste Hindu officers. The Depressed Classes of India, U.S. Office of Strategic Services,(Washington, D.C.: Research and Analysis Branch Report 9U. May 27, 19^3), p. 21. The training company which formed the nucleus of the present Mahar Machine Gun Regiment was formed on October 1, 19^2, at Kampti. The 1st Battalion Mahar Regiment, however, was raised on October 1, 19^1 at Belgaum, the second on June 1, 19^2, at Kampti and the third on November 1, 19^2, at Nowshera. These Battalions, which were not limited to Mahars, did not go to the fighting areas. They served, however, in guard duties during the evacuation of Muslims from India to Pakistan and in the Jummu-Kashmir fighting later. The Regimental History of the Mahar MG Regiment (Dehra Dun: Army Press, 195H.T

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London, one more seat in the Central Assembly, and the creation of a reserved seat in the Council of States. Toward the end of his period of service in the Executive Council as Labour Member, Ambedkar published one of his major polemics against Congress, What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables. In detail and passion he wrote of the wrongs suffered by Untouchables and of the "hypocritical" behavior of Congress and Gandhi in giving verbal sympathy while blocking any constructuve change.

But so concerned was he with writing the book and with

governmental affairs that he neglected the preparation of his political party for the 19*+6 elections.

A letter to B. K. Gaikwad in

January, 19*+6, shortly before the elections indicates that he "cannot say who should be put up for what constituency.

I leave that to

you."37 The igk 6 elections for the provincial legislatures saw the Scheduled Castes Federation defeated in its first election.

The

impressive success of the Independent Labour Party in 1937 was not duplicated as general electorates generally returned Congress or Independent candidates for the reserved seats.

No Scheduled Caste

Federation candidates were returned in Bombay, and only one each to the Bengal and Central Province Legislatures.

In materials prepared

Keer, Dr. Ambedkar, pp. 359-360. See Leiah Dushkin, "Special Treatment PolicyT5*"in The Economic Weekly, Vol. XIII, Nos. L3-L6, pp. 1665-1668, 1695-1705, 1729-1738, for a full discussion of govern­ ment benefits to backward classes. 37Letter to B. K. An earlier letter is even December 12, 19*+*+•• "I am want to get out of it and

Gaikwad, January 29, 19*+6, from New Delhi. more telling. Ambedkar wrote Gaikwad on not going to be very long in politics. I devote myself to something more congenial."

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by Ambedkar for the Cabinet Mission which came to India in May of 19^6, figures are shown which indicate that in the primary elections, in which Scheduled Castes alone voted, the Federation received more OQ votes than the Congress in Madras, Bombay and the Central Provinces, areas in which Ambedkar was well known.

Another document produced for

the Cabinet Mission charges that terrorism and intimidation as well as open hostility on the part of returning and polling officials were reasons for the election failure. 39

But Sir Stafford Cripps felt that

it was not possible, "even had we decided to do so, to arrange for Dr. Ambedkar's organization to have any special right of election in the Constituent Assembly.

It had failed in the elections and we could not

artificially restore its position."^ Failing in his pleas to the British Government and in the elections. Ambedkar resorted to extra-parliamentary action to press the demand for recognition of the Scheduled Castes as a separate element in Indian political life.

The Scheduled Castes Federation

conducted large-scale satyagrahas for separate electorates before the state legislatures at Poona, Nagpur, Lucknow and Kanpur from July to October 19^6.

Little publicity was given these demonstra­

tions, but they are remembered in U.P. and Maharastra as great ^®A copy of his chart is in C. B. Khairmoday's collection of Ambedkar materials in the Bombay University Library. 39b . R. Ambedkar, The Cabinet Mission and the Untouchables (Bombay: privately printed, n.d.) Ambedkar's press was burned in the spring of 19^*6 , and there seems to have been open warfare in some localities of Bombay and Nagpur between Untouchables and caste Hindus. k^Anil Chandra Banerjee and Dakshina Rajan Bose, The Cabinet Mission in India (Calcutta: A. Mukherjee, 19^6), p. 108.

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occasions, which masses of people entered into as devotees to the cause of separate electorates and other demands for political

r i g

h

t s

divided into three states. In December of the same year, Thougnts on Linguistic States was published and in this the thesis was developed that democratic participation would increase snd the central government would remain strong if large linguistic areas were divided into states comprising natural regions rather than united as large states. 5Q7 In this document, there xs no direct state­ ment that the Maratha caste, the dominant agricultural caste in Maharashtra, would be a danger to the Untouchables in a united Maharashtra^Jbut the message was so understood.

Ambedkar pled for

separate regions within the Marathi-speaking area on the grounds that minorities and Scheduled Castes needed a place of refuge.

"If there

was a United Maharashtra with Bombay in it where can they go to for safety...the same tyranny [by the Marathas] was practised over the Brahmins, Marwaris and Gujarathis living in the villages when Godse [a Brahman] killed Mr. Gandhi."

Another argument for a Maharashtra

5Tb . R. Ambedkar, Maharashtra as a Linguistic Province (Bombay: Thacker and Co., 19^3). ^ Times of India, November 21, 1955. R. Ambedkar, Thoughts on Linguistic States Ino information given.] (At end of preface: Milind Maha Vidyalaya [Milind College] December 23, 1955-) o0Ambedkar, Thoughts on Linguistic States, p. 2k. In reprisal for the assassination of Gandhi by a Brahman, and also because of a

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divided into West, Central and East sections, with Bombay as an independent Maharashtrian city-state, was the opportunity for developing political life in each area, and, again, the example focused on the Marathas: talent.

"The Marathas are lacking in political

There is no man of evidence among them such as Tilak, or

Gokhale or Ranade.

The Maharashtrian today counts for nothing...It

is therefore absolutely essential to train up Maharashtrians in political life...Those who are going to rule Maharashtra are not Marathas by speech but Marathas by caste, notwithstanding the hopes of the Brahmins. Nor it cannot be denied that Marathas are politically the most backward community [and three Maharashtrian states would offer more scope for developing political abilities.]"^ Ambedkar’s earlier phblic espousal of the same ideas provoked a letter in the Times of India on May 9, 1953, which both criticizes Ambedkar as an anti-Maratha communalist and recognizes the political awakening of the Mahars: The manner in which he [Ambedkar] has bracketed the Banias with the Brahmins as sufferers in the aftermath of Gandhiji's murder and the shrewd way in which he has tried to segregate the Malis and Kolis from the Marathas, leads to the inference that he is about to embark on some new political-cum communal strategy with the Marathas as his victims. It is not numerical superiority but political enlightenment and communal consciousness that ensures the political future of a community. The Marathas are woefully deficient in both... As a matter of fact it is the Harijans whose cause Dr. Ambedkar long-standing sense of grievance against Brahmans by non-Brahmans, Maharashtrian villagers, chiefly Marathas s burned Brahman homes in a violent demonstration of antipathy all through the western rural areas of the state. As a result, there are many villages in Maharashtra,. especially in the Desh, today where no Brahmans are found. ^Ambedkar, Thoughts on Linguistic States, p. 28.

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so vehemently espouses that can give points not only to the Marathas but even the Brahmins in the matter of political enlightenment and communal consciousness. . Ambedkar's fear of Maratha dominance seems not to have been communicated to his followers in any such intense degree.

In the

fall of 1956 he reluctantly gave permission, under pressure from his eager lieutenants in the party, for the Scheduled Castes Federation to align itself with the Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti (United Maharashtra Group,) and Mahars (many of them by then Buddhist) entered into the agitation for a united Maharashtra.

The sympathetic

presence of Y. B. Chavan, the leading Congressman in Maharashtra and a Maratha, acts against a Mahar-Maratha consciousness of divergent interests at the top state level.

And there seems to be little overt

realization of the Marathas as a danger to Untouchables among the Mahars themselves.

Village troubles, which continue to explode on a

caste basis, are chiefly between Maratha and Mahar, but the ideological enemy is still the Brahman. The Republican Party The second realization, that the Scheduled Castes Federation must give way to a party based on a larger constituency, led to the announcement of a new political party shortly before Ambedkar's death.

As early as October, 1955, Ambedkar stated that the time

had come to demand the abolition of reserved seats, and that he might ^Times of India, May 9, 195^; letter from S. B. Savant of Mahad. The Malis and Kolis belong to agriculturist castes distinct from the Maratha but of the same general status.

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form a new political party.-3 The irony of Ambedkar and subsequently his party's denying what had been so strenuously fought for, reserva­ tion of seats for Untouchables in legislative bodies, went unnoticed. The fact that reserved seats in a general electorate generally brought in Congress candidates over those identified with a Scheduled Caste Farty caused a complete shift in the two parties' attitudes.

Congress

now held on to the idea of reserved seats and the Scheduled Castes Federation rejected that special privilege.

But even had the abolition

of reserved seats been pushed through the legislatures, no gain would result unless Ambedkar's party could secure a broader electcrs.1 uS.se• On the eve of conversion in Nagpur, October 13, 1956, Ambedkar announced that a new party, the National Republican Party, would come into existence before the next elections.

Its principles

would be liberty, equality and fraternity; it would be open to all; and it would have nothing to do with the present Scheduled Castes Federation. fth The thought behind the new party was much like the expectation which accompanied the conversion — that the Untouchables would be brought into a larger group.

However, there

was even less organizational preparation for the building of a larger political group than there had been for the creation of a revived Buddhism. The groups which Ambedkar envisioned as the support of the new party were the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes and the Backward Classes, together comprising over 30% of India's population. ^ Times of India, October lU, 1955* 6**Times of India, October 15, 1956.

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But while efforts to evoke political awareness had been successfully made in regard to the Scheduled Castes, there was no parallel political awakening among the Scheduled Tribes and Backward Classes. That the possibility of cooperation among all "dispossessed peoples" was a late awareness of Ambedkar’s is shown by his attitude toward the Scheduled Tribes ten years earlier.

In an address to the All

India Scheduled Castes Federation on May 6, 19^5, Ambedkar outlined a plan of representation in the legislatures based on population figures minus the aboriginal tribes.

He explained the omission:

"The Aboriginal Tribes have not as yet developed any political sense to make the best use of their political opportunities and they may easily become mere instruments in the hands either of a majority or a minority and thereby disturb the balance without doing any good to themselves. Aside from some conversations with S. D. Singh Chaurasia, a Backward Classes leader from Uttar Pradesh66 and an exchange of ^Address by B. R. Ambedkar to the All India Scheduled Castes Federation, May 6, 19^5 (privately printed), p. 25. Accusations that Ambedkar denied Scheduled Tribes rights and his defense that he does not claim to be their leader ("The problem of the Untouchables is quite enough for my slender strength") and also that they "do not as yet possess the political capacity which is necessary to exercise political power for one's own good" were reprinted in Aboriginals Cry in the Wilderness: Controversy between Dr. Ambedkar and A. V. Thakkar ^Bombay: A. V. Thakkar, Servants of India Society, ca. 19^5.) Ambedkar evidently knew Jaipal Singh, leader of the Jharkhand Party which for a time expressed Scheduled Tribe interests in Bihar, but there seems to have been no development of a firm alliance. Information from Amar Singh, Phila. October, 1965. ^Conversation with S. D. Singh Chaurasia, Delhi, January, 1965.

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correspondence with Rammanohar Lohia of the Socialist Party,

6*7

in which Lohia took the initiative, Ambedkar seems to have neglected

for the new political alliance in the rush of

preparation for the conversion ceremony.

He was also a sick man

at the time, with less than two months to live.

The actual

formation of the Republican Party did not take place until October, 1957* after Ambedkar's death, and the elections earlier in that year were fought by the Scheduled Castes Federation under its old name and with its old personnel. Another legacy left somewhat unwillingly to his political followers by Ambedkar was the weapon of the demonstration.

Although

he occasionally threatened mass protest, as in the case of the go

campaign to modernize watan in the late 1920's,

_

he used this method

sparingly and always, though without ideological commitment to ahinga, non-violently.

The temple entry satyggrahas at Amraoti,

Poona and Nasik and the Mahad Satyagraha of 1927 demonstrated that the Mahars would respond to a call for mass demonstration, in spite of village reprisals for the participants.

Although the Mahars'

absolute minority in any locality made this sort"of mass action dangerous, Ambedkar gave the early satyBgrahas his support.

It is

^The correspondence is published in Rammanohar Lohia's The Caste System, (Hyderabad: Navahind, 196H). ^®0n August 3, 1928, Ambedkar told the Bombay Legislative Council that if the bill he had proposed to rectify Watan injustices did not pass, "I am going to spend the rest of my time in seeing that the Mahars organise a general strike." Bombay Legislative Council Debates. Volume XXIII (Bombay: Government Central Press, 1928T, p. 721. The bill did not pass, rv.d although Ambedkar continued to call meetings on the question ox W&nan, he cook no protest action.

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clear that he himself was not the chief agent in planning them, but he undergirded the idea by stressing courage and militancy for the Untouchable.

An often quoted Ambedkar saying is,

"Goats, not lions, are sacrificed."

In the political arena,

Ambedkar was responsible for three mass demonstrations:

the Anti-

Khoti march and the one day strike against the Industrial Trades Disputes Bill in 1938, and the 19^6 satyagrahas at the provincial legislatures for separate electorates.

In the 1950’s extra-

parliamentary action found a new field - satyagraha for land. Ambedkar seems not to have planned the 1953 land satyagraha in the Marathwada area of Maharashtra, then in Hyderabad State, but he did write the Minister for Home Affairs in Hyderabad, offering to intervene and to ask the Scheduled Castes to drop the satyagraha if satisfactory Cabinet decisions regarding the land which had been granted and then resumed were made.^

After Ambedkar’s death, a

massive land satyagraha in 1959 in the Nasik-Ahmadnagsr area; silent marches protesting various grievances which drew 300,000 participants in the winter of 196U-1965;

70

a huge public procession in July, 1965, *7

■ »

to protest single-member constituencies; x and an "anti-starvation" ^Letter from B. R. Ambedkar to Shri Bindu, Minister for Home Affairs, Hyderabad State; in the files of Nanak Chaad Rattu, Ambedkar's personal secretary at that time. The letter indicates that 1700 Scheduled Caste men and women had been jailed. "^The leaders of the satyagraha, all officials of the Republi­ can Party, presented a Charter of Demands (New Delhi: privately printed, October, 196*0 before the Satyagraha took place. (see conclusion) The estimated number of participants is from Republican. Party sources. 7-*-Painlk Mar&thg (Marathi.)

Bombay, July 13, 1965-

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protest in 1965 joined by all opposition parties in Southern Maharashtra1 indicate that the method sparingly used by Ambedkar may become an important part of his party's operating technique. Although Ambedkar did not succeed in giving the Republican Party a coherent shape and structure in a broader new image before his death in December, 1956, he did leave the Mahars and Buddhists of Maharashtra and pockets of other Scheduled Castes in other provinces with an intense political awareness.

In normal political

processes or in extra-parliamentary action, the Republican Party can call on a committed constituency.

The Mahar political movement has

penetrated to every village in Maharashtra and the party established by Dr. Ambedkar, although troubled after his death with dissention among its leaders, has by and large kept the loyalty of his castefellows.

A political scientist has written, "It must be admitted

that, at least in Maharashtra, the scheduled castes in general and the Mahars in particular, are politically more conscious than many other higher caste g r o u p s . A n d two Maharashtrian anthropologists •''ound "in all the three villages studied, people of the scheduled castes appeared to be politically more conscious and better informed 72Mahar£3htra Talma (Marathi) Bombay, August 21 and 22, 1965. The protest centered in Satara and Kolhapur in Maharashtra and was called off when the Kashmir troubles began. As in the case of village incidents in which Untouchables or Buddhists conflict with caste Hindus, more publicity is given these Republican Party protests in the vernacular than in the English press. T3v. M. Sirsikar, "A Study of Political Workers in Poona," Journal of the University of Poona, Humanities Section #13, 1961, pT tH T

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of the affairs of the world in general than the rest of the population. Ambedkar said in 19Wr: be a governing community.

"Our aim and aspiration is to

Let all of you bear that in mind and

let all of you write it on the walls of your houseB..."75

I

have seen these words, in Marathi, on the walls of a library opened by a Mahar for the children of his community. political awakening has been achieved.

The

In conjunction with a

sense of duty toward the Untouchables on the part of caste Hindus, aroused by Mahatma Gandhi and by a general intellectual commitment to equality, this awakening has resulted in the fact that "probably nowhere in the world is so large a lower-class minority granted so much favorable special treatment by the government as are the Depressed Classes of India today. And although the political movement today has no program other than to press for the fulfillment of already made commitments and for a generally socialist program, the political consciousness of Ambedkar's followers remains, available to any leader whose claim to Ambedkar's mantle is recognized. f^Irwati Karve and Y. B. Damle, Group Relations in Village Community (Poona: Deccan College Monograph Series 2 k , 19^3)7 ip* 69^ The Mail (Madras,) August 26, I9UU. ^Dushkin, The Policy of the Indian National Congress..., p. 1.

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There are areas still left for future struggles.

The

Untouchables, along with the tribal peoples, are the poorest of all in a poor land, and government jobs and government waste lands can answer the needs of only a few.

There are still subtleties

of discrimination even for the urban and educated, detailed in Harold Isaacs' India's Ex-Untouchables.77

In the villages, wells

and temples are almost without exception still closed to the lowest castes, and Untouchables' attempts to discard lovlj tasks or to claim equal rights not infrequently bring violence in their wake.

Positions in private business are difficult to

obtain and in industry the less skilled, lower paid jobs are still the main portion of Untouchable labor.

The platforms and

pronouncements of the Republican Party suggest that they have no better answer to these problems than the improvement of India's economic condition as a whole, the nationalization of land, and the implementation of remedial laws already on the books. The political awakening has made the Mahar more self-respecting, more conscious of his rights, willing to vote or to demonstrate when his accepted leaders call.

The Buddhist conversion has

released him from his place in the Hindu hierarchy and, from his point of view, given him a new identity, although it has not won this admission from the caste Hindu.

Ambedkar continues

to be a symbol to the Untouchable and to the caste Hindu that one ^Harold R. Isaacs, India's Ex-Untouchables (New York: Day Co., 196U.)

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John

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of the lowly can reach a place of the highest stature.

*7 Pi

These

factors are still at work, like a yeast, in the Indian situation. 7ft

The Mahar/Buddhist use of Ambedkar as a symbol of achieve­ ment cannot be overstressed. Mow, twelve years after his death, a picture or a statue of Ambedkar or a quotation from his writings is the ever-present symbol of ex-Mahar pride and self-respect. Recogni­ tion of Ambedkar’s achievement by other groups may be indicated by two instances: An anthropologist found Ambedkar, Shivaji and Jawaharlal Mehru the three most recognized of fourteen public figures among all castes in a Maharashtrian village. (See William A. Morrison, "Knowledge of PolJ"! cal Personages Held by the Male Villages of Badlapur: An Introductory Delineation," Sociological Bulletin, Vol. X, #2 (September 1961), pp. 1 - 2 6 and Vol. XII, #1 (March 1963)', pp. 1 IT. A tribute by K. M. Panikkar in The Foundations of New India (London:... Allen and Unwin, 1963), p. 95, indicates another sort of common tribute: "The intellectual classes were the new Brahmins of India, an aristocracy of learning, sacrifice and service. Dr. Ambedkar, the leader of the erstwhile untouchable classes, may be considered the most representative non Brahman of the age."

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CONCLUSION

The tangible legacy that Dr. Ambedkar left the ex-Mahars is best seen in the three major institutions which he founded, the Peoples' Education Society in 19^5, the Buddhist Society of India in 1953, and the Republican Party in 1956. Mahars.

None of these is confined to

All have influenced, directly and indirectly, other castes

than. Mahar and other areas than Maharashtra.^ Nevertheless, they are the heritage of the Mahar movement and serve as the dominant influence today on the educational, religious and political spheres of Buddhist life. A brief look at these institutions twelve years after the death of Dr. Ambedkar from two viewpoints will offer some judgment on the current situation of Ambedkar's people in modem India.

First, do

these institutions vindicate the philosophy that guided much of Ambedkar's social and political action: If all these communities [the Depressed Classes] are to be brought to the level of equality, then the only remedy is to adopt the principle of inequality and to give favoured treatment to those who are below the level.^ Second, do these institutions justify the claim made in the introduction ■*"For an example of a non-Maharashtrian caste influenced by Ambedkar's methods and organization, see Owen M. Lynch, "The Politics of Untouchability: A Case from Agra, India," in Milton Singer and Bernard S. Cohn (eds.), Structure and Change in Indian Society (Chicago: Aldine, 1968), pp. 209 - 2V0. ^Keer, Dr. Ambedkar . p. 80. -287-

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uo this study, that the Mahar movement under Ambedkar was unique in the height to which some of its members rose; the spread of the move­ ment throughout the community, and the choice of non-traditional or modern methods as vehicles of change? The Peoples' Education Society had, before Ambedkar's death, founded two college complexes, one in Bombay and one in an area which then had no university, Aurangabad in Marathwada.

Since his death,

colleges in different fields have been added to the original institu­ tions and another college has been built in Mahad, the Konkani town which saw the historic Chowdar Tank satyagraha in 1927-

The Society

also runs three high schools in Bombay and Aurangabad, manages Backward Class hostels in Pandharpur and Dapoli, and administers grants-in-aid to seven other hostels scattered over Maharashtra.

In

1964, there were 7000 students in the institutions of the Peoples' Education Society, of which 3000 belonged to the Scheduled Castes, 2i Scheduled Tribes and other Backward Classes. To the work of the Peoples' Education Society must be added another college founded by Nagpur Buddhists on the ground where conversion took place, and innumerable schools and hostels in many Maharashtrian towns.

Many

Scheduled Caste children also go to Government schools and colleges. In all these institutions, both faculty and students are from caste Hindu as well as Scheduled Caste and Buddhist communities. ^K. B. Talwatkar, Secretary, Peoples' Education, Society. The board of managers is composed of Maharashtrian Buddhists, Gujaratis and several caste Hindus. Although all hostels supported by government grants are re­ quired to be mixed in caste composition of residents, the Mahar run hostels are often predominantly Mahar.

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The sum total of all this educational work, duplicated by no other group of the same social and economic level as the Buddhists, indicates the zeal for education with which those in the Mahar move­ ment became imbued.

It is a common view in Maharashtra that, next

to the advanced castes, the Buddhists are most consistently concerned about education.

One observer told me, "The Buddhists will go back

into Hinduism eventually, but not as Untouchables.

Because of

education, they will have a higher status." Whatever the future situation, the ability of the Buddhist or Mahar now to get education rests on his special privileges.

Without

government scholarshipst the average Buddhist could not give his child a secondary school or college education.

With education, the ex-

Untouchable can pass, if not completely out of untouchability, at least into the fairly confortable world of the lower middle class, or even higher.

The community counts seven or eight Ph.D.’s, some of

whom hold important positions in govemm nt agencies.

Here the formula

of special privilege works more thoroughly toward its egalitarian goal than in any other field.

Not, however, without causing some resent­

ment of those special privileges on the part of castes not so privileged. Although the educational urge has produced no scholar of note in the Buddhist community, it does fulfill the claim that the movement has spread to the lowest reaches of the caste and the claim that the movement’s vehicles of change have been in the modern idiom. Same heights have been reached in the corollary of education, the production of literature.

The Maharashtrian urge to write, to

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record the achievements of individual, family, caste or village, is also apparent among the ex-Mahars.

In addition to an abundance of

songs, discussions of Buddhism, and political polemics produced by writers with little claim to fame, three Mahars have become part of the Maharashtrian literary scene.

N. R. Shende of Nagpur has written

novels, essays and biographies, and compiled a book of Indian folk­ lore.

Although he is not a well known writer, he has served as

President of the literary society of eastern Maharashtra, the Vidarbha Sahitya Sangh. more fame.

Shankarrao Kharat of Poona has achieved considerably

He has five or six volumes of short stories to his credit,

a collection of Dr. Ambedkar's letters translated into Marathi, a study of the conversion movement, and informal histories of Dr. Ambedkar's leadership and Untouchable progress in Maharashtra as well. The third author, C. D. Khairmoday, has published five volumes of a projected eight volume biography of Dr. Ambedkar in Marathi, making full use of documents and attempting to present an objective study rather than the usual adulatory biography.

A fourth literary figure

coming from Maharashtrian Untouchables is related obliquely to the Mahar movement.

It is reported that the intellectual stimulus for

Annabhau Sathe, a Mang writer of short stories and novels, is Communist ideology, but he has dedicated at least one of his works to Dr. Ambedkar. The Mahar or Buddhist intellectual is generally a-political and somewhat cut off from the competitive, active, politically-oriented life of his community.

Nevertheless, he writes out of his experiences

in the community, and although others may resent his exclusiveness,

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they take pride in the public recognition of his achievements. As is also common in Maharashtra, a society has developed to further the interests of the literary group.

The Bauddh Sahitya

Sameian (Buddhist Literature. Conference) meets to hear literary papers and to discuss the history of social literature. in Bombay was followed by a Poetry Conference.

Its meeting in 1967 At both meetings,

caste Hindus and Buddhists participated in leadership and presentations. The other necessity for any Maharashtrian group, a newspaper, has also been an integral pant of the movement's life.

Although Ambedkar's

paper, Prabuddha Bharat, predominates, others spring up in various areas, often flourishing only for a brief time.

A historically-

minded Buddhist has compiled a volume, in Marathi, of all the news­ papers primarily concerned with the problems of the Untouchables.

He

lists one hundred twenty, the great majority of them in Marathi.5

A discussion of Ambedkar's second functioning organization, the Buddhist Society of India, is more difficult.

Now under the leadership

of Ambedkar*s son, Yeshwant Ambedkar, the Society is not highly organized.

Local initiative counts most often for any progress in

building Viharas, holding study classes, finding a B'nikfchu to live as a guide in the community, conducting processions or meetings on Buddhist holy days.

The Buddhist Society of India, however, does send

representatives to international

st meetings and recently held a

Buddhist Conference in Bombay, has erected a Sanchi-like stupa over the cremation place of Dr. Ambedkar, and serves as an umbrella, at least in ^5. Sh. (Appa) Rajjpise, Dalitancl Vyittpatre [Newspapers of the Depressed Classes], Bombay: Bnausaheb Adsul for Maharashtra Bauddh Sahitya Parishad, 1962.

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name, for the many local activities of Buddhists. The conversion to Buddhism was an attempt to find another way than special privileges to raise Untouchables to a level of equality. It has been effective in building self-respect and in loosening the’ hold of feelings of inferiority, although it has not essentially changed the status of the Mahar/Buddhist in the caste Hindu mind. conversion has brought a dilemma to Buddhists.

The

All special privileges

under the administration of the central government, and all special privileges in states, except in Kerala and Maharashtra, are closed to those who claim to be Buddhists. "compensatory discrimination."

A few Buddhists welcome this lack of The majority consider the special

privileges their right on grounds of past suffering and present economic restrictions, and do not list their children as Buddhists until they have made their way through the educational system and into government jobs.

Buddhist leaders claim that the loss of deserved

special privileges hinders the conversion movement, and that many would become Buddhists if it did not cut off their educational and economic opportunities.

Petitions to government to extend special

privileges to Buddhists from Scheduled Caste communities on a national level have not met with success. Although a few Maharashtrian Buddhists have become Bhikkhus, there sure no well known leaders solely within the religious sphere. The spread of the movement, however, indicates its penetration to the masses.

And if the discouragement of magic and ritual sacrifice can

' be counted as modem, the conversion fits into the rubric of moderniza­ tion.

Even the presence of the picture of Dr. Ambedkar in every Vihara,

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although it seems to be in some ways a cult object, recalls the things he most often preached:

education, moral (middle-class) living

standards, rationalism, unity, self-respect — none of them part of the traditional mode of life for the Mahar. The forte of the participants in the Mahar movement continues to be politics.

The Republican Party was announced by Dr. Ambedkar in

1956, but did not take organized form until 1957.

Ambedkar's lieuten­

ants, somewhat uneasy about the idea of conversion, preferred to fight the elections of 1957 under their former name.

After the elections,

they, without altering the composition of the groups involved, declared themselves the Republican Party.

The 1957 elections have been the only

major success of either the Scheduled Castes Federation or its suc­ cessor, the Republican Party.

The issue of a -united Maharashtra,

separate from Gujarat and including Bombay, over-rode all other considerations.

The Scheduled Castes Federation, by joining in the

Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti (Committee for United Maharashtra), won nineteen Legislative Assembly seats in the state.

Elections in 1962

and IS67 were fought without a broad emotional issue to combat the charge that the Republican Party was a communal group, and in both these elections, the Republican Party's seats in the provincial assemblies and in the Lok Sabha have been negligible.

The Party does,

however, command significant numbers of voters among the Scheduled CasteE and Buddhists in Maharashtra, and in areas of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Mysore (near the Maharashtrian border) and Gujarat. In its search for viable alliances and for leadership to replace Dr. Ambedkar, the Republican Party has taken several directions.

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-29**There are leadership splits in the two major areas of concentration of party strength: Pradesh.

Maharashtra and the Agra-Aligarh areas of Uttar

In Maharashtra, the leadership of B. K. (Dadasaheh) Gaikvad,

long-time associate of Dr. Ambedkar and mainstay of the Mahad and Nasik satyagrahas, has been undercut by defections to the banners of younger, more highly educated men.

In addition, Gaikwad recently

joined his majority portion of the Republican Party to the old enemy, Congress, in an unsuccessful election alliance in 1967-

The result

was not only the usual defeat, but the declaration of 500 young men in Gaikwad's own area, Nasik, that they would reject his leadership and seek alliance with the Socialists.^ The special privilege of Scheduled Caste representation, so long an issue, has now been rejected by the Republican Party.

In the

north, the joint electorate, even in areas where the Republican Party is strong, generally brings in Congress Scheduled Caste candidates. In this instance, special privilege does not work to the advantage of Ambedkar's followers.

Rather than make the now-impossible demand of

separate electorates, they seek alliances.

And their program, at

least in part, is aimed at a wider audience than the Scheduled Castes. The most recent demands of the Republican Party reflect Ambedkar's inclusive, modernizing tutelage, although they are couched in less sophisticated terms than he would have devised.

After demonstrations

in which Scheduled Castes and Buddhists in Maharashtra, Mysore, U.P. and Punjab participated by the thousands, the following Charter of Demands was presented to Government in 196**:

%ahT5r5shtra Taims (Marathi), December 27, 196?•

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1.

Portrait of Eaba Saheb Dr. B. P.. Ambedkar - "The Father of the Indian Constitution" must be given a place in the Central Hall of Parliament.

2.

Let the land of the Nation go to the actual tiller of the land.

3.

Idle and waste-land must go to the Landless Labourers.

U.

Adequate Distribution of Food Grains and control over Rising Prices.

5.

Lot of Slum Dwellers be improved.

6. Full implementation of Minimum Wages Act, 19^8. 7. Extension of all privileges guaranteed by the constitution to such Scheduled Castes as embraced Buddhism. 8. Harassment to the Depressed classes should cease forth-with. 9. 10.

Full justice be done under the untouchability, (Offenses) Act, to them. Reservation in Services to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes be completed as soon as possible not later than 1970. The Republican Party, with the exception of a recent party

founded by Mangs in Maharashtra, is the only party dominated by exUntouchables in India.

Political aspirations have taken other groups

in different ways, the Iravas and Scheduled Castes of Kerala into the Communist Party, the younger generations of Scheduled Castes in Madras into the Dravida Munetra Kazhagam (D.M.K.), the majority of Scheduled Castes in other areas into Congress.

The general import of the

political awakening, whether by a caste-based party or absorption into larger parties, has been to bring the Scheduled Castes more fully into common Indian life.

The view that caste is not a barrier to democracy

^The Charter of Demands^, submitted to Lai Bahadur Shastri by the Republican Party of India. Dadasahib B. K. Gaikwad, B. P. Maurya, B. D. Khobragade. (New Delhi: 196U).

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-2 9 6 -

is now fairly widely accepted.

Pradeep Shah has written:

It may even be said that, in the changed political environment, caste would become the chief vehicle for mobilizing the vast illiterate masses of India in the democratic political process... ultimately leading to patterns of secularly motivated political allegiances that cut across caste lines. The Mahar movement has not reached that final stage.

The

burgeoning middle class among the Buddhists may eventually push them into new political allegiances.

At this time, loyalty to Dr. Ambedkar

and his views plus the possibilities of leadership in institutions related to the community keeps the vast majority within the established structure.

New alliances and allegiances, however, and a spirit of

cooperation if not unity, may be found at times in the top layers of leadership.

The political scene which was the chief battlefield for

Ambedkar and Gandhi has now become an arena for some cooperation, if not completely satisfactory relationships.

Some governmental actions

which Ambedkar would have heartily approved are taken in the name of Gandhi.

In a recent speech to the Rajya Sabha, made when Scheduled

Castes protested they were ignored in parliament, Indira Gandhi called for bringing "one of [Gandhi's] near dreams to reality" by giving education, employment and land ownership to "Harijans" and ensuring "that people belonging to the Scheduled Castes and Tribes are put in positions of Authority where they can solve their own and others' problems. 7 Q Pradeep Shah, "Caste and Political Process" Asian Survey, Vol. VI, No. 9 (September 1966), p. 518. See also Lloyd and Susanne H. Rudolph, "The Political Bole of India's Caste Associations," Pacific Affairs, Vol. XXXIII, No. 1 (March i960), pp. 5-22. ^Times of India, August 13, 1967.

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-2 9 7 -

The ideological reasons for this entente in a modern India claiming social Justice for all are clear.

A change in attitude on

the part of Ambedkar's followers is also apparent, not only in their respect for the Maharashtrian Congress leader, Yeshvantrao Chavan, but also in such statements as this gentle correction from the leading writer in the community, Shankarrso Kharat: The annihilation of untouchability was not to be achieved by the viewpoint of the great ones such as Mahatma Gandhi, but a beginning was made, and its echo had a good effect on the Eind of the caste Hindu people. We should respect this.-1-®

The practical reasons for the more cordial relationships concern the current depletion of Congress Party power.

The vision

Ambedkar had of Untouchables holding the balance of political power in a party system may soon be evident within the Congress Party itself. On the national scene, the lessened majority of Congress makes its Scheduled Caste legislators important.

Eighty of the 115 Scheduled

Castes and Tribes members of both houses are Congressmen, and although they do not function as a block, they can muster a crucial vote on some issues.

"They are being carefully cultivated by the three

principal power groups inside the party."11 It is clear that the politicization of the Scheduled Castes was a modern vehicle for change.

It is also clear from the amount of

political activity that this interest has penetrated the former Mahar community down to the village level.

Ambedkar alone, however, still

10Shaijkarrao Kharat, DS. BabSsAheb~Ambedkarance Dharmaptar [Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkarfs Religious Conversion] , (Poona: Sri Lekhan Vacan Manda. 1966). p. 19* ^Times of India, August 21, 1967.

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-298-

occupies the heights of fame.

Congress leaders, chiefly Jagjivan Ram,

a perennial Cabinet Minister, and N. Sanjivaya, Congress President for a short time, are better known on the national scene than any Republi­ can Party member currently.

The "senior Scheduled Caste representa­

tive" whom Prime Minister Gandhi recently included in the Indian Delegation to the United Nations, however, is an ex-Mahar Buddhist. R. D. Bhandare, former Republican Party leader, recently became a Congressman. symbols:

The switch was accompanied by a publicized exchange of

a picture of the Buddha and Ambedkar's book for a picture

of Gandhi and a national flag.

In his new identity as Congressman,

Bhandare was chosen to represent India at the United Nations in the spring of 1968. Ambedkar’s pinnacle of fame is still secure, however.

No

other leader serves so well as a symbol for the "vital dimension of self respect" necessary to any movement of the depressed.

After the

I96I+ satyagraha, a statue of Ambedkar was erected in front of the Parliament House in New Delhi. 12 portrait on a postage stamp.

He was recently honored with a

The urge to express their own claim to

fame by honoring Ambedkar continues, not only in Maharashtra but occasionally among other groups.

Three Harijan members of the Gujarat

Assembly belonging to the Svstantra Party conducted a fast and a stay-in strike to demand the installation of a portrait of the late Dr. Ambedkar in the House.

While the strike was on, they stuck a

small picture of Dr. Ambedkar on the wall of the House, beside the 12A photograph of the statue appeared in the Hindu Weekly Review, April 29, 1968.

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-2 9 9 -

official portraits of Mahatma Gandhi, Pandit Nehru, Sardar Patel, exPresidents Rajendra Pradad and

Dr.

S.

Radhakrishnan.*^

The area left untouched, except as a by-product, by Ambedkar's three organizations is that of economic advancement.

The watan was

abolished in 19^8, and with it the last official sign of the tradi­ tional Mahar inferior role in the village.

But this does not affect

the well being of the majority of Mahars and Buddhists who are agricultural laborers.

Ambedkar's programs cf separate settlements

and the grant of waste-lands are still voiced occasionally as pos­ sibilities, but in a crowded India, already land-hungry, they are not viable solutions.

The colleges of commerce attempt to train Scheduled

Castes for trade, but the majority of such graduates enter government service, as do other educated Scheduled Castes.

Government service,

although it extends to printing establishments, railways and other government enterprises in addition to administration, will not absorb many more of the Scheduled Castes when its 12.5$ of the posts reserved for them are filled.

The Gandhian methods of economic uplift have

served some, but do not affect the majority.

Improvement in

scavenger's conditions has come about in several large cities; encouragement to enter the leather trade in an organized way may absorb a few more; Vinoba Bhave's land-gift program undoubtedly touches the Scheduled Castes, but its significance is not yet clear.^ ^ Hindu Weekly Review, April 1, 1968. li+For information on governmental activity, anti-untoucnability matters, the activities of Gandhian workers, and the general progress of Scheduled Castes, see the annual Report of the Commissioner for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Delhi: Manager of Publications.)

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-300The Mahar movement has created an educated, active middle class; it has given solidarity and self-respect to villagers and industrial workers.

And these two groups are tied together by

loyalty to the movement and by leadership possibilities within it. The bonds between elite and mass are both a bench mark of the move­ ment and an indication that further group progress may be made. Dr. Ambedkar's insistence on rights and on special compensa­ tion for disabilities was underwritten in the second half of his leadership period by the advocacy of separatism.

In the minds of

some, this separatism enforces caste consciousness and hence discrimi­ nation by caste.

Another view, based not only upon this movement

but also on those of other depressed peoples in other countries, is that separatism is a normal stage in the process of coalescing group power and building self-respect.

It seems clear that the level

cf integration the Untouchables have reached came about because of an earlier stress on political and religious separatism and compensatory d is crimina t ion. It is more difficult to compare the Mahars as a caste to other Untouchable castes than to point out what seem to be their unusual accomplishments.

A lack of comparative caste histories and

of caste-based statistics on educational and occupation achievement makes such a task impossible, even if it were worthwhile.

Perhaps

it is enough to say that the history of the caste is a story of upward group movement, bolstered by the political and social changes around it and involving remarkable personalities, both among Untouchables and among caste Hindus.

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-3 0 1 -

India's effort to create a just society is still in the making, but its history is a worthy one. aspect of that history.

The Mahar movement is one

Although the Mahars chose the way of

modernization rather than Sanskritization, and although the features of their movement —

political demands, inner reform, insistence on

leadership from within the group, pride in past history, separatism, rejection of orthodox religion —

have parallels in the movements

of other oppressed peoples, the methods and the mood of that movement are thoroughly Indian.

And in the response to the movement, a

response given quickly enough to avoid permanent separation and total frustration, all Indians have cause for pride.

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