
Ambedkar as an idea of religious liberation and social equality still wields considerable sway in the political imaginations of Dalit people. This permanence of memory makes political appropriation of Ambedkar indispensable for BJP to vertically consolidate Hindu votes. And till date, new BJP under Modi-Amit Shah has been successful in this feat, while wider ideological incongruities are disguised under communal rhetoric.
But, for RSS, owning Ambedkar is more crucial task to project unified Hindutva appeal, irrespective of caste and creed. The fact that Ambedkar revolted against hierarchical injustice of Hindu religion and chose conversion to wriggle out of oppressive religious establishment flies in the face of RSS’s ideological attempts to idolize ‘father of Indian constitution’. While he is regarded as supreme architect of Indian constitution, his wider contributions to social reforms have been conveniently obliterated by RSS.
In the new avatar of Ambedkar, preferred by RSS and cohorts, Ambedkar is shorn off his crucial identity of social reformer. Instead, he is propped up as a crusader against Muslim identity and appeasement politics. Through a special issue dedicated to Ambedkar in May 2015, RSS mouthpieces ‘Panchajanya and Organizer’ presented Ambedkar in Hindutva strand of modern Indian history.
This new Ambedkar is facile result of selective shuffling of vast Ambedkar intellectual exercise. He is celebrated as staunchest supporter of partition. His reservations of minority rights have been flagged. And, more importantly, his rejection of Islam and Christianity as picks of conversion is patronized by RSS. An Ambedkar peddled through communal and jingoistic terms of the organization.
The project of appropriating Ambedkar to consolidate Hindutva started from 1960s. During ‘Mandal period’ Ambedkar icon was cleverly employed to stem off caste polarization of Hindu community. When Ram Mandir became the glue of Hindutva, Ambedkar lost utility for the time being. Changing social and political realities of the country brought back new adoration for Ambedkar. The caste consciousness generated by Mandal politics and upward mobilization of Dalits through reservation rendered Ambedkar an icon of belongingness. When identities were fast fraying in post liberalization period, Ambedkar assumed new ideological prominence and was soon followed into political vocabulary.
Then, who was Ambedkar? Was he Christian-Muslim baiter as alleged? How is to read Ambedkar? While Ambedkar is admitted into the pantheon of Hindutva, these questions solicit answers. The nagging problem in understanding Ambedkar is the peripheral reading of him, instead of holistic approach. ‘Pick and choose’ reading of Ambedkar’s intellectual writings deforms its message. Rather than final suggestive conclusions, his methodology of social analysis is of notable substance. He has to be understood in full, not in hyphenated silos.
BJP and RSS through their projection of Ambedkar as a nemesis of Indian Muslim cultural identity, are tactfully entombing the revolutionary social ideas of Ambedkar. For them Ambedkar is a reaping political tool to serve larger ideas of Hindutva. This communal crust painted on him makes Ambedkar a safer bet to ride roughshod over fissiparous project that Hindutva is.
Ambedkar’s criticism of Islam in South Asia is more relevant now to grasp community’s progress in independent republics. He was truistic to argue that Islam in South Asia is bereft of its emancipatory zeal as it absorbed caste segregation into its fold. He was also prophetic to foretell the wobbling existence of theocratic state in nation state framework. On Uniform Civil Code, he asserted compatibility of Islamic law with secular policies and alerted to the inevitable possibility of Islamic law and surrounding politics trumping over community’s advance to modernity.
All the criticisms proved realistic. Were his criticisms out of animosity towards Islam? Holistic reading of Ambedkar busts this communal analysis. As a social liberator who believed in modern ideas of equality and democracy, he positioned all religions out of state ambit. He dismissed wholesale fallback to religion, and instead backed rational society. He was vociferous in his criticism of both Congress and Muslim League in harping back to religion in their fight against colonialism. So, Islam, in the business of politics of his time, constituted hurdles in his ambition of a progressive society. This was his rational postulation for opposition to Islam. To quote only Ambedkar’s monograph ‘Pakistan or Partition’, first published in 1940, to vouch for his Islamophobia is outright fictious. This monograph has to be understood against the dominating communal politics of Muslim League and Ambedkar’s solution for political deadlock.
Absence of a social reformer like Ambedkar in Hinduism among Indian Muslims helped accentuate caste differences in the community. While elite sections of the Muslim community donned the role of community leadership, thus cornering all benefits of new republic and using lower caste Muslims only as political subjects. The same analogy applies to BJP politics today with Dalit class.
On his choice of conversion to Neo Buddhism, he was coherent in his attitudes to religions. Rather than adopting a religion as a path to heavenly salvation, Ambedkar was looking for an immediate, temporal solution to Dalit people. Thus, Islam and Christianity with its emphasis of hereafter life and intangible divinity was far from assuring. Also, he was on lookout for indigenous, ritual-free religion as identity marker. Thus, love and wisdom of agnostic Buddhist teaching was more accessible and intelligible to him. Also, it rebelled against the casteist profession of Hindu religion.
By commanding Ambedkar against minorities and projecting as a critic of communal politics, his revolutionary ideas of social reformation is washed under the carpet. As the election results show, this misappropriation offers rich political dividends. This historical dislocation of Ambedkar also makes him amenable to RSS ideology. But what is truly undermined is his aspiration for a progressive country with social equality and equal opportunity. His resentment of using religion in statecraft is contorted to prove his communalism.
Mubashir Vattaparamban is a PhD student at Jamia Millia Islamia, specializing legal politics in the colonial period.