For An Informed Ambedkar Age
by Chandrabhan Prasad A novelist friend has just returned from Oxford. She was there to attend a Dalit-related talk where the UN-sponsored World Conference Against Racism, to be held in Durban this year, came up for discussion. She wondered why European scholars were not easily prepared to equate caste-based discrimination with that of race. Another …
by Chandrabhan Prasad Has any political scientist ever called the Communist Party of India’s (CPI) 1957 victory in Kerala a political triumph of the Ezhavas, Nadars and Thiyyas – major upper Shudra castes – but one which was headed by a communist-Brahman, EMS Namboodiripad? Read More Can the Left Front or Congress-led fronts win elections …
by Chandrabhan Prasad Despite having been close to becoming the first Dalit Chief Minister of UP, Ramdhanji has died an unsung death. On May 23, 2001, Dalits lost the mirror which most truthfully reflected the social contradictions of the “cow belt”. Read More Ramdhanji supported Indira Gandhi to the hilt during the Congress’ first split …
by B. R. Ambedkar Paper presented at an Anthropology Seminar taught by Dr. A. A. Goldenweizer Columbia University 9th May 1916. Text first printed in: Indian Antiquary Vol. XLI (May 1917) [1] Many of us, I dare say, have witnessed local, national or international expositions of material objects that make up the sum total of …
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar’s Vision Of A New Social Order by Gail Omvedt It is truly an honour to be given the opportunity to deliver the first Dr. Ambedkar memorial lecture of the new century and the new millennium. Though this is officially the 5th Dr. Ambedkar Memorial Annual Lecture for the Year 1999, it has …
by Gail Omvedt To hold that distinctions of caste are really distinctions of race and to treat different castes as though they were so many different races is a gross perversion of the facts. What affinity is there between the Brahman of the Punjab and the Brahman of Madras? What affinity is there between the …
ANCIENT INDIAN COMMERCE COMMERCIAL RELATIONS OF INDIA IN THE MIDDLE EAST * The imperial Romans flashed their sword both in the East and the West with different results. In the East ” they conquered the world only to give it to ” *(……..) in the West however ” they either Romanised the races who …
by Gail Omvedt Dear Siri–Sami Bangaru Laxman, I would like to congratulate you on becoming the president of the BJP. (I should also preface this by explaining why I address you as Siri: Shri is Sankskritised and north Indian; most Maharashtrian Dalits prefer Ayushaman. Tamils, on the other hand, prefer Thiru. You, I understand, are …
Gail Omvedt The wave of rioting at the time of the Mandal Commission showed that the goal of reservation had not simply been unfulfilled, but totally distorted. It revealed, among other things, the degree to which educated upper caste youth had gotten into the habit of considering the Government administration not as “public service” …