Edited by K Raju, ‘The Dalit Truth’ reflects on issues faced by the community

Surinder S Jodhka

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This is the eighth book of the series, ‘Rethinking India’, being published by the Samruddha Bharat Foundation. The book has been edited by K Raju, a former bureaucrat, currently an active Congress member. However, the book is not a party or political document. The essays do not present a biased position. In fact, many provide a strong critique of the Congress and its approach toward the political and developmental concerns of the ex-untouchable communities.

However, the book and the series do foreground the Nehruvian and Gandhian vision of building an inclusive India, which, as the editors would claim, is also embedded in the Constitution and has a stamp of the chairperson of its drafting committee, BR Ambedkar. The published volumes also reflect the broader vision of Congress politics. They underscore the fact that these foundational values and the institutions supposed to protect and promote them are currently under severe stress.

Besides the editor’s introduction, the book has 12 essays, broadly covering three sets of issues. The first revisits Ambedkar’s vision of ‘the Dalit truth’. In the opening chapter, Sukhadeo Thorat says that though Ambedkar was not particularly delighted with the way the Independent Indian state worked during his lifetime, he had great hopes from it. For Ambedkar, ‘a nation was not a people synthesised by a common culture derived from a common language, common religion or common race’. Nationality, for him, was a modern-day sensibility, ‘a sentiment of oneness’ where every citizen treated the other as if they were ‘kith and kin’. For him, democracy had to be a mode of forming social relationships in everyday life. It envisioned a different mode of being with fellow citizens, which was not possible in a culture divided on caste lines. Hence, his critique of ‘Hindu society’. A society structured around values of hierarchy cannot recognise the value of ‘rights’. India is failing to progress along Ambedkar’s vision, Thorat argues.

In the following chapter, Raja Shekhar Vundru provides a comprehensive account of Ambedkar’s uncomfortable relationship with Gandhi, the signing of the Poona Pact and the reservation policy post-Independence. Though the system of representation through quotas was not a choice that Ambedkar liked, Vundru is hopeful that the Constitution is “fully equipped” to provide due political space to the Scheduled Caste communities.

Kiruba Munusamy opens the delicate question of ‘caste and judiciary in India’ and makes an emphatic appeal for increased diversity within the system, which would also imply giving due representation to those from the legally recognised marginalised categories.

The next series deals with the emerging issues concerning the Dalits. The papers range from asking for ‘leveraging international institutions to address caste’ (Suraj Yengde) to the growing influence of right-wing politics and saffronisation of the Dalits. Caste has the capacity to mutate and can travel beyond India. The process of globalisation also offers opportunities for building alliances against discrimination.

While Dalits have indeed been able to successfully raise the question of the persistence of caste-based discrimination on the relevant global fora, their politics at home also seems to be “regressing”. They are being tempted by the Hindutva politics. Bhawar Meghwanshi provides an account of the appropriation of Ambedkar and other Dalit symbols by the RSS, while Badri Narayan exposes the fault lines of the Congress politics, which has weakened its appeal among the SCs. The problem, he says, is not merely a missing political connect, but also with their approach. The Congress has been working within the “rights” framework while the need was to also focus on questions of dignity and culture. How could Hindutva politics find appeal among the Dalits? The Congress needs to engage with such questions by going to the ground, he argues.

In their essays, Dalit leader Jignesh Mewani and political scientist Sudha Pai discuss the challenges being confronted by the Dalit communities, the context of economic liberalisation on the one hand and the growing power of the Hindu right-wing politics on the other.

The book also has a chapter on Dalit representation in cinema (Pa. Ranjith), education (RS Praveen Kumar), Dalit entrepreneurship (Priyan Kharge and Neeraj Shetye) and redesigning the Dalit development paradigm (Budithi Rajshekhar). Together, the essays offer a rich discussion on the present context of the Dalit situation. While they cover a wide range of issues, they do not offer a simple or easy road ahead.