April 14, 2015, wil mark the 125th birth anniversary of Babasaheb Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar. Dr Ambedkar was an India’s foremost advocate who fight for empowerment of Dalits.
Dr Ambedkar was an economist par excellence and his work in this field had laid the foundation for the country’s central bank ‘Reserve Bank of India’.
He planned India’s first river valley project to generate power and irrigation facilities. He had also drafter the far-reaching Hindu code bill to liberate vast majority of women and finally resigned from union cabinet when this bill was not passed by the Parliament.
However, Dr Ambedkar’s greatest and least known contribution was to stretch the idea of the nation-state to include India’s vast diversity of people, cultures and their differing aspirations. For him, nation is a philosophical entity with shared dreams as its central theme.
He always quoted French philosopher Ernest Renan saying that, “A nation is a living soul, a spiritual principle. Two things in truth but are one, constitute the soul.
Baba sahib led many social movements like Mahad Satyagraha for equal right for Dalits like to drink water from a public tank, temple entry rights movement and movement to burn the Manusmriti. He had warned that without having social and economic equality, our nation may face existential crisis.
It sprang from his steadfast belief that there could not be sustainable liberty without equality and fraternity. “How can people divided into several thousands of castes belonging to one nation,” he said.
Forefathers of Indian constitution had agreed with Babasaheb’s view on the need to have reservations for oppressed classes. Dr Ambedkar’s view to have equal rights for women in the family was later endorsed by the Parliament.
For Babasaheb had famously said, “I measure the progress of a community by the degree of progress which women have achieved”.