Anand Teltumbde is a civil rights activist, political analyst, columnist and author of many books. He has a long association with peoples’ struggle spanning over three decades backing his theorizations on various issues. Trained in technology and management from the top institutes in the country, he marshals his insights of the modern techno-managerial world to sharpen strategies of struggles. In a well-articulated conversation with Vidya Bhushan Rawat, that he responded electronically, he explains various aspects of Ambedkarite-left politics and also suggests a way forward.

VB: Anand ji, how to you assess the status of Ambedkarite movement in India since the demise of Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar.

AT: To say that the Ambedkarite movement today is in lamentable state may be a grossly understatement. What we see going in its name is the exhibition of identities, Ambedkar himself having become an inert icon supplying that identity; rampant opportunism, everybody floating a shop for political brokerage in the name of devotion to Ambedkar; ideological bankruptcy, openly joining enemy camps for pelf and power but claiming to serve Ambedkarite cause; explosion of scholars rewriting what Ambedkar wrote or showering empty superlatives over him; toeing the lines of power that be for self-aggrandizement; and indulgence in never ending mutilation of what Ambedkar stood for. There are other strands of these to be seen in social media—outpourings on Facebook, whatsapp groups, and such others, with a new tribe of activists thriving in virtual space.

The question as to what really constitutes the Ambedkarite movement may have to be answered. Is it just anything swearing by the self-proclaimed followership of Ambedkar that makes an Ambedkarite movement or is there any criteria to determine it? While it may not be easy to answer this question, there being many facets of Ambedkar’s own struggle, one may broadly take a clue from his vision and say that any movement that is oriented to make society move towards liberty, equality and fraternity may be termed as Ambedkarite. Naturally, the movements that privilege caste identities could not be Ambedkarite. The movements that do not raise voice against the violation of democratic rights of people cannot be Ambedkarite. The movement that is not socialistic is not Ambedkarite. Babasaheb Ambedkar stressed this value triad in terms of political, economic and social democracy. These criteria may be supplemented by additional features associated with the persona and character of Babasaheb Ambedkar such as his iconoclasm, rationality and scientific attitude, integrity, dedication, etc.

If we test out what passes as the movements of Dalits on these criteria, we may not get any that comes even within the consideration zone. It is with this understanding that I say that there are no Ambedkarite movements existing today. Being Ambedkarite does not mean worshiping Ambedkar or making him a cult figure, least capitalizing on it for selfish ends. But that is precisely every movement of Dalits is engaged in. What is seen as Ambedkar movement is the growing congregations at the newer and newer places being discovered as associated with him, the ever growing number of statues and monuments subtly aided by the state, growing panegyric literature much of it is pointless, building of Buddha Viharas in competition with the Hindu temples just as the marker of identity; growing number of seminars, conferences and meetings that appears to engage/accommodate the growing tribe of educated Dalits with sophisticated version of Ambedkar bhakti. There is a pseudo concern of the employed Dalits in the name of the ‘payback to society’ in distributing food packets and providing medical aid, etc. to the poor masses of Dalits who congregate at the places like Chaitya Bhumi and Deeksha Bhumi, indirectly promoting them. Of course there are better versions of it, although in small numbers, that seek to provide coaching, scholarship and extend financial aid to needy Dalit student. The entire Ambedkarite movement is seen in the form of these activities, which do not even remotely connect with what Ambedkar stood for. Many of them may rather be seen as antithetical to his persona and vision.

It needs to be understood that what Babasaheb Ambedkar practiced was pragmatism imbibed from his Professor John Dewey while in Columbia. He did not believe that there could be a science of history and therefore some abiding laws of societal development. Therefore, what he did was to figure out the best possible way in the given situation to advance the interests of Dalits. Therefore, apart from the abiding and unflinching commitment to the cause of Dalits (later expanded to entire humanity) one may not find a theoretical string that could be extended to any length of in future. The Ambedkarite movement was supposed to carry on what Ambedkar did, towards certain goals like annihilation of castes, achieving his dream society based on liberty, equality and fraternity as discussed before. The only methodological prerequisite was the sterling commitment to the cause and as he said to the extent avoiding violence and dictatorship.

After his death in 1956, the movement experienced sudden vacuum of leadership as there was no leader who could take his place. But the leaders had huge personal ambitions. According to J V Pawar, who chronicled the significant events around the time, right after his cremation at the Chaitya Bhumi, the politicking among the Maharashtrian Scheduled Caste Federation (SCF) leaders had begun. Babasaheb in his last days had toyed with an idea to form a non-Congress, non-Communist opposition party by bringing all prominent leaders under its banner. He had sent the proposal to socialist leaders like Dr Ram Manohar Lohia and S M Joshi. Nothing is known about their responses but at Nagpur, while addressing a mammoth gathering collected for Dharmantar (conversion to Buddhism) he spoke out this idea of forming a new party, Republican Party of India (RPI). Since the 1957 elections were round the corner, the post-Ambedkar SCF leadership decided to defer the decision and fight elections on reserved constituencies although they were supposed to have forsaken Hinduism and were no more the Scheduled Castes. The leadership issue was sorted out by having a collective leadership in the form of seven member presidium. But it did not last long.

Just about a year after the formation of the RPI, in deference to the wishes of Ambedkar on 3 October 1057, the vertical division in the party precipitated. Each faction began claiming to be a true heir of Ambedkar. The division sharpened when Dadasaheb Gaikwad, who had better bond with masses and who had enjoyed relatively greater confidence of Ambedkar than any other leader began talking about the livelihood issues of the Dalits. B C Kamble, by virtue of being an advocate, presumptuously claimed to know the Constitution more than anyone else. He accused Gaikwad of speaking the language of communists. The anti-communist sentiment was ripe in minds of people, as communists were seen as responsible for the defeat of Ambedkar in the 1952 election. These sentiments were duly capitalized by the anti-Gaikwad faction for denigrating him. Gaikwad, not entirely devoid of personal ambition, however, knew the pulse of masses as well as what Babasaheb Ambedkar desired. In his later years, Ambedkar was getting increasingly frustrated as the things he did his entire life, did not seem to produce desired result. In one of such bouts of frustration, he lamented to the Marathwada unit of the SCF that visited him at his residence in Delhi in 1953 that whatever he did had benefitted only a small section of the urban educated Dalits and that he could not do anything for the vast majority of Dalits in rural area. He wondered to the leader of the unit, B S Waghmare, whether he would be able to organize a struggle for demanding land for the rural Dalits. Immediately after his return Waghmare organized a land satyagraha in Marathwada with the help of Gaikwad. Some 1700 people had gone to jail in this first ever struggle for land (or any material issue) in the history of of Ambedkarite movement. After the death of Ambedkar, Gaikwad reenacted the land satyagraha in 1959, this time in much bigger scale in the Khandesh-Marathwada region of the then Bombay province in which many socialist and communist leaders participated and went to jail along with Dalits. The RPI under Gaikwad organized a countrywide land satyagraha in 1964-5 on an unprecedented scale, which lasted for nearly a month, each day hundreds of people including women and children courting arrests. The resolve of Dalit masses to fight for their livelihood issues reflected by this land satyagraha alarmed the government at the center. It responded with a strategy to coopt the Dalit leaders. None other than Dadasaheb Gaikwad would fall prey to this strategy inaugurated by the then chief minister of Maharashtra, Yashwantrao Chauhan. Gaikwad fully conscious of the consequences could not however save the party from the damage. The strategy opened the floodgates for Dalit leaders to join the Congress or indirectly work for it. The RPI, deformed at the birth itself, would not survive thereafter but for in the name claimed by innumerable factions.

The independent Ambedkarite movement had virtually collapsed by mid-1960s. By the late 1960s, the political emasculation of the Dalits began showing up in rising atrocities. In the wake of the global unrest and particularly taking inspiration from the Black panthers Party in the US, the Ambedkarite youth, pouring out of universities just to have dark future staring at them despite the chimera of reservations, began giving expression to their feelings of frustration emulating the genre of Black literature. From this movement of Dalit literature was born the Dalit Panthers movement. The very name emulating the Maoist Black Panthers Party in the US and in the background of the birth of another militant movement in Naxalbari in North Bengal, the Dalit Panthers sent a shockwave across the ruling establishment. But before it could set its tone through some militant action, it split on the point of deviating from Ambedkarism. A faction led by Raja Dhale accused the other led by Namdeo Dhasal of being under communist influence. It was a rehash of the split in the RPI on the basis of an idiotic syllogism, that speaking about material interests of the masses was communism, Ambedkar was opposed to communism and hence anything that raised the livelihood issues was against Ambedkar. This time it was constitutionalism but Buddhism. Dalit Panthers thus just proved to be a flash in pan.

Dalit Panthers went the RPI way, with much rapid degeneration than the latter. The electoral politics by then had become intensely competitive with the emergence of regional parties threatening the political hegemony of the Congress. The very processes of creating a class of rich farmers using seemingly the people-oriented policies like land reforms and Green Revolution but intended to create a political ally in rural India had led to this aftermath. The small bunch of votes which were available in the forms of castes and communities assumed disproportionate importance in the first-past-the-post (FPTP) elections and with that the value of brokering. It gave rise to a tribe of brokers in the guise of Ambedkarite leaders. In the crowd of these fraudsters the nostalgic Dalit masses were increasingly drawn towards Ambedkar icon which in turn was exploited by the ruling classes in subtly deforming Ambedkar. Babasaheb Ambedkar who remained an ignored figure for almost a decade, so much so that his son had to take out a march from Mahu to Mumbai collecting small donations from people to build a small structure at the place of his cremation in mid 1960s, began to be monumentalized by the establishment all over the country. The gullible Dalit masses would not understand the stratagem of the ruling classes and would increasingly fall for it, setting in a vicious cycle. What remains now of the Ambedkarite movement is these statutes of Ambedkar, Buddha Vihars, congregations in his memories, hymns and identity hysteria.

VB: Why, in your opinion, RPI which could have become a strong secular progressive force as visualised by Dr Ambedkar, could not achieve much.

AT: RPI was conceived by Babasaheb Ambedkar as a non-communist opposition party to the then ruling Congress. What was to be progressive in it is really not known. What I imagine is that Ambedkar was not very comfortable with a seemingly caste based party like SCF. It was occasioned by the political development triggered by the Cripp’s report in 1942. Now that its utility was over and also that its historical performance has been listless, he was naturally inclined to revive the idea of his very first party, the Independent Labour Party (ILP) under the new name, more fitting to the constitutionalism that he propagated. The Congress being a party of the capitalists, the natural opposition party was a party of labour. But labour was associated with the communists. Ambedkar was historically cut up with the communists, and particularly bitter with them for having defeated him in the 1952 elections. They, however, were the major opposition party, although distant second to the Congress. Weighing the relative strength of the parties and taking cognizance of the huge dominance of the Congress, strategically it would have been a good idea to forge a broad coalition of all socialist and communist parties. After all, the communists had adopted the parliamentary path. The RPI, relying upon ideologically amorphous socialists outside the communists was not destined to be a major opposition party to the Congress. The very fact that it failed to take off, perhaps speaks volumes about its poor strategic basis.

I am not sure Babasaheb used secular for the RPI. The ‘secular’ is the most abused term in this country popularized by so called progressives. What I know is that the RPI was to be the non-communist opposition party to the dominant Congress. It may rather be likened to the Janata Party that emerged in 1970s, as the major opposition party to the Congress, that did not hesitate in include the Bharatiya Jan Sangh (BJS). The ‘secular’ that signifies the firewall between religion and politics was disposed of during the Constitution making itself. When the subcommittee of the CA decided to have it, none other than Nehru, who is supposed to be the biggest secularist around had rejected it and as a result the Constitution did not contain this term. There is no evidence that even Babasaheb Ambedkar also contradicted the ruling version of dharmnirapekshta. It is well known that in November 1948, Prof K T Shah, representing Bihar in the CA, had moved an amendment to the effect that “India shall be a Secular, Federal, Socialist Union of States.” It was Babasaheb himself who opposed it saying that the Constitution was “merely a mechanism for the purpose of regulating the work of the various organs of the State” and what the policy of the State or how the “Society should be organised in its social and economic side are matters which must be decided by the people themselves according to time and circumstances.” It is a different matter that he was a strong votary until his first speech in the CA of hardcoding the socialist structure of the society into the constitution!

India is not a secular country; it is a dharmnirpeksh country, and de facto a Hindu country, as the likes of Mohan Bhagwat rightly claim. The Constitution does not have this word; it was inserted by Indira Gandhi paradoxically during the Emergency, perhaps to complete the joke on the Indian people. Well, coming back to the question of the RPI, how would such a party emerge as a strong party? What binding force the motley combination of leaders with all ideological hues would have held it together? What would be its constituency? What would be its goal?

Indian elections are fought on the strength of money, muscle and communal power, all of which are evil. Without resorting to these evil, no party would really survive in India. Communist party was the biggest opposition party in the parliament in early years. Its electoral success was due to its struggles in certain pockets of the country. But leave apart building upon it, the party could not even sustain itself. With what imagination one could say that the RPI would have been different? Yes, there are examples of the Dravidian parties (DMK and AIDMK in its present avatar) surviving as the electoral parties and whether one sees the portents with open eyes, until yesteryears, the BSP also achieved electoral success. The pertinent question to be asked here is whether they could really do justice to their professed goals. What remains of these parties is a different hue of the ruling class parties. They have enriched their leaders but have kept their constituency vulnerable.

As a matter of fact, neither Ambedkar nor his party could succeed in post-colonial elections.

Whether RPI could have been successful is a purely hypothetical question. The more pertinent question is whether it could have been successful in promoting what Ambedkar willed. My answer to this question is in flat negative. The proof of my saying is the fact that no party, small or big, or even the parliamentary communist parties, swearing by the working classes, could really serve the interests of poor in this country. The structure of politics sucks you in and dissolves into its colours. Electoral successes could be manipulated and success could be claimed as the BSP did. But as the BSP experiment amply proved, you cannot defy the grammar of this politics. Money, muscle, communal arithmetic drives you away from the masses into the so called mainstream rendering you indistinguishable from any other ruling class party.

VB: You have been with the left movement and always talked about bringing caste and class issues together. Left has rarely accepted the caste as the primary source of exploitation in India but many of your writings confirms the fact that you too look from the class angle. Could you please explain why you insist class matter and secondly why there is a remote possibility of left and Ambedkarite coming together?

AT: Yes, I have been with the political left (not with any party) for the most part of my life and also willed that the communist and the Dalit movements should converge to make a strong unified revolutionary force. It is not bringing class and caste together but enclosing castes within a class. I have serious objection to the constricted conception of class the communists and even others have. My definition of class subsumes castes. This is the mistake of the early communists that has cost Indian poor their revolution. Marx said that the history of all hitherto existing society was the history of class struggles. How could then castes that were the life world of the subcontinent for most part of the known history be left aside from the class analysis? Neither class analysis of the Indian society nor class struggle in India could be conceived without taking cognizance of castes. This is the greatest blunder of the Indian communists that may be traced to their Brahmanic proclivities to adhere to the given word. In pre-capitalist world classes manifested in various forms; castes also were the forms of classes.

It does not mean ignoring castes. In fact nothing is ignored. Revolutions are not a theory that you assume away something and proceed; you have to confront social reality. Castes, genders and every other such issue are a social reality and they need to be dealt with as part of the class struggle. It is a process to enhance revolutionary consciousness. Castes, given their peculiar characteristics (quite unlike any other social category) cannot be the basis of struggle in any other way. We have experience with various caste struggles for over a century. They reveal that they could not make any dent to the existence of castes. Whatever changes that have crept in them are due to the advent of capitalism and modernity piggybacking it. I have explained it in my book Anti-Imperialism and Annihilation of Caste and many other writings. Castes only drive you deeper into the ditch.

Today despite these caste struggles, arguably, India is more casteized than it was ever in history. Class struggle is the prime mover of the history and cannot be contrasted to any other struggle. It does not mean only economic struggle as the ignoramuses made it to be. They subsume all other struggles. In India class struggle necessarily incorporates anti-caste struggle. There cannot be a separate front where castes can be fought against. This has been historical folly in India. Of course, for this I hold the communists responsible because they claiming the ownership of analytical arsenal of Marxism could not use it. Babasaheb Ambedkar, a pragmatist by confession, was devising his praxis as the situation unfolded and hence his blame becomes certainly lesser.

No, I am not pessimistic. Both the movements marching separately have reached their points of extinction. It is natural that at least a section of their adherents has begun realizing the mistake and thinking of correcting themselves. Unlike others I do not speak/write in vacuum; I am intimately in touch with the struggles afield and do have a sense that such realization is fast dawning on the youngsters on both sides. The times are, however, uncongenial for such manifestations. But the things cannot rot for long. There will be a way out.

Yes, there is big hurdle in the path. The mushrooming middle class of Dalits represent that hurdle. They do not want it. They have whipped up the identity obsession among the Dalits and made Ambedkar a marker of that identity. They will naturally prevent it happening. The class characteristics of these Dalits tend to prefer the status quo because it has brought them some stature and material prosperity. They would not want it change. Revolution moreover demands sacrifices, which has not been in their grammar. But that is not the case with the multitude of the Dalit masses. Their condition craves for change. They do not have anything left to lose but their pitiable condition. And therefore they would like to have a revolution. The only problem they do not know what it would be like, what it would entail. It is not only in India but also the world over, people ceased to believe in revolutions and their promises. The communists are solely responsible for this state of mind. They have only given them failures. They need to squarely accept it. Those who want change from the status quo, may have to be low on rhetoric and high on creative strategies. The odds are serious but not insurmountable. The same old stereotype of revolutionary rhetoric and slogan mongering would not work. It will demand new creative ways. The entire revolutionary theory in the context of the contemporary techno-managerial context of the world will have to be rethought. The pace of change in the contemporary world is so rapid and accelerating that no ism howsoever scientific it may be can be relied to offer us solution. Revolutions, as such, have always been a serious enterprise and they cannot be spoken superfluously. They always demand hard work and sacrifices.

VB: Is not it true that the left has historically not considered Ambedkar as icon of the Dalit identity and culture. In fact many of them went on to criticise him to the extent of not even considering him as an intellectual. Is it not the brahmanical arrogance which many of the left ideologue suffer from?

AT: Who says they haven’t? Have all Dalits in contrast really considered Ambedkar as their icon? It is only the Mahars in Maharashtra and their equivalents in other states have accepted him as their icon of identity and culture. It was as such a caste affair, pure and simple.

Over time there has been promotion of this icon by the state and he is made what he is today. When India became independent, the ruling classes had adopted Gandhi as their icon. He remained for initial decades the state icon but with the change in times began losing its luster. It outlived its utility by 1980s. The aura of independence struggle and the ethos of Indianness that the Gandhian icon represented became out of tune by the time India became neoliberal. The ruling classes needed to replace it. Ambedkar, who historically contrasted Gandhi and presented his antithesis, came handy as an icon for the neoliberal India, which was considered as the antithesis of the welfare state during the Gandhian phase. It is therefore that they began projecting him as the free market economist, pro-globalization figure, a monetarist and what not particularly through some of the Dalit brokers masquerading as intellectuals. Ambedkar’s modern look combined with liberal and pragmatic views came to perfectly fit in the requirements of the new icon for neoliberal era.

The role of the state in making up the Ambedkar icon cannot be missed. Apart from monumentalizing efforts, it opened up Ambedkar centers everywhere. There was a sudden spurt in so called research on him in universities. Ambedkar, almost an abhorrent figure for the elite, suddenly became venerable. The bout of bhakti Modi expresses for him just illustrates it starkly.

As a matter of fact, as explained above, Ambedkar’s iconization had begun from the late 1960s itself. The turning point came with the 1964-65 all India land satyagraha. Dalits for the most part until then had engaged in cultural struggles; against Brahmanism which was in a way abstract, challenging really no one. If they turned towards their economic deprivations, as this struggle reflected, it would pose real threat to the entire structure. Therefore, the Congress had launched its cooptation strategy. There were other factors too that contributed to this trend. As explained earlier, intensification of electoral competition and consequent importance of the vote banks made it imperative to icnonize Ambedkar to woo the Dalit voters. Gradually thereafter, one finds roads being named after Ambedkar, his statutes dotting them, institutions being named after him and his pictures adorning them. The nostalgia of the Dalit masses in the face of dilapidation of the Dalit movement by then also aided this trend in a significant way.

As for your question that the Left has historically not considered him as an icon of the Dalit identity and culture, I do not see it as such. Initially, it is true they did ignore him rather if you go to his times; the communists ridiculed him as some hardliners among them still do. But later with their own degeneration, they also could not keep themselves away from the electoral logic. Some of them tacitly realized their mistake in ignoring castes but the peculiar cultural attitude not to admit mistakes prevented them from speaking that out loudly. Today all the communist parties do acknowledge Ambedkar. Even the Marxist-Leninist parties, popularly called naxalites, who do not have electoral compulsion as the parliamentary parties have, do acknowledge his work and contributions.

But why and how does the Left considering or acknowledging Ambedkar as an icon of Dalit identity and culture become important? How consequential it is either for the Dalit emancipation or the Indian revolution? I would rather ask why should Ambedkar be only a Dalit icon? Ambedkar acquired a universal vision as he evolved. Why should he be demeaned to the mean status of just being a Dalit icon? I am also against this iconization business. Icons, on the positive side, can inspire certain ideals but on the negative side they can also distort the reality. The very concept of icon distances it from the reality and makes it objectionable.

Ambedkar need not be an icon for anyone but should be seriously considered for what he has to offer for the creation of the new world based on ‘liberty, equality and fraternity’ as he proclaimed. His own attitude towards the great people was similar. He dismissed the heroes and great men in no uncertain terms and proclaimed himself as an iconoclast. Why make him an icon and insult him? All great people—who looked beyond their self and strove for betterment of humanity—have something to say as to how to reach there. And they all should be considered important for their thoughts and actions. One needs to mind, however, that they are simultaneously limited by their won space and time. In the past with slow pace of change their thoughts and actions could guide us in dealing with our problems but not now. We may be inspired by their vision but may not be able to use their thoughts, actions or methods because the entire reference points may have undergone change. Our world demands novel strategies to deal with and limits utility to that extent of the past. Perhaps this dictum would invalidate privileging any ism as the solution. What is important with them (and those which are not been fortunate to be taken as such) is the insights they had.

As regards your comment about Left criticism, both communists as well Ambedkar criticized each other. Because, their constituencies had a huge overlap, the criticism was quite natural. Communists viewed that Ambedkar was dividing the working class and he criticized them that they did not pay attention to caste discrimination that the Dalit workers suffered under their nose. Apart from that the communists’ superficial understanding of the Marxian metaphor of ‘base and superstructure’ led them to believe that mere struggle against caste was pointless. But I do not think that they denied him his intellectual status. Despite the intrinsic intellectual arrogance that the communists reflect, they swallowed his claim in 1938 public meeting that he had read more books on communism than all communists taken together. These issues rooted in the dynamics of times a century before should not trouble us but because of our identitarian obsession they keep deflecting our present focus too.

VB: You have been participating in various programmes of the left Dalit alliances. How is it happening? Do you think possibility of them coming together or will it break due to wider perspective gap among them?

AT: I have already explained that unless Dalits adopt class orientation, they are not going to be successful even in their anti-caste struggle. To have class-approach does not make one automatically communist or Marxist, least the adherent of some political outfit. That is the only approach that could bind all oppressed people together and bring in a hope of annihilation of castes. I am not enamoured with the communist parties that exist in India. My concern is with the movements, there are movements beyond parties. Given the state of politics on both sides, there is little that one hopes for. I see a need to make a new beginning. Yes, I see hope of that happening too. Despite numerous odds in our path, there are enough people who listen to us. It is better to have right orientation than having wrong results. The world today has gone very complex. People will have to be on their toes to comprehend it and devise viable strategies towards making it better for the vast majority. What I do is to prepare them doing that.

VB: Rohith Vemula's institutional murder gave different left and Ambedkarite groups an opportunity but then they split again. The Hyderabad Central University Elections and later the JNU Student elections both places the left parties refused to accept or support the Ambedkarite or Dalit Bahujan groups like BAPSA resulting in much bitter altercation among them. How do you react to this?

AT: It is unfortunate tha

Hastakshep