BJP and Ambedkar: Maharashtra minister not first party leader to spark row

The latest to find himself in the middle of a political firestorm is Maharashtra’s Higher Education minister Chandrakant Patil whose comments on Ambedkar and social reformer Jyotiba Phule sparked controversy on Friday.

Addressing a university programme in Aurangabad on Friday, Patil said, “Those who started schools, Ambedkar, Phule … they did not depend on government aid. They started schools by going to people and begging, by saying, ‘I am starting a school, please give me money.’”

The use of the word “begging” struck the BJP’s rivals as offensive. Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole hit out at Patil, saying, “BJP leaders are so intellectually bankrupt that they have no qualms about making insulting statements about great men. While none of the BJP leaders have apologised for the statement about Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, Patil has criticised Mahatma Jyotiba Phule, Karmaveer Bhaurao Patil, and Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar.”

He added, “Patil probably does not understand the difference between begging and asking for donations. Money was collected in the form of subscriptions and donations from people and schools were opened. Patil has insulted these great men, the great work done by them and the Bahujan community by saying they asked for ‘bheek (begging)’ for their work.”

NCP state president Jayant Patil said, “Comparing the structural work of these great men to begging is nothing but an intentional disrespect of these great men.”

Clarifying his statement, Patil said later in the evening, “Who started schools? Ambedkar and Phule. This is the truth. What I meant was begging for funds is akin to present-day concepts of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), donations or crowd-funding.”

On Saturday, ink was thrown on Patil by people identified by the police as members of the Samata Sainik Dal, an organisation founded by Ambedkar in 1924, and the Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi, a political party founded by Ambedkar’s grandson Prakash Ambedkar. Three members of these two outfits have been remanded to police custody till December 14.

Past controversies

In April, senior Goa BJP leader Satish Dhond spoke about Ambedkar’s conversion to “Buddhism and not Islam or Christianity”, while speaking at a programme in Panaji to mark the BJP’s Assembly election victory.

“He (Ambedkar) suffered a lot as a Dalit but despite that he did not become a Christian, he did not become a Muslim … Ambedkar said he will be a Buddhist. Why? Buddhism was founded in this country … All the things he wrote in the Constitution (equality, brotherhood) were all there in Buddhism and that is why he accepted Buddhism. Now you think about it. If he had become Muslim, if five lakh Dalits in this country would have become Muslims, what would have happened? There would be another Pakistan in this country,” Dhond said.

In January 2020, then Gujarat Assembly Speaker Rajendra Trivedi questioned Ambedkar’s contribution to the making of the Constitution. Trivedi told the audience at a global Brahmin Business Summit in Ahmedabad, “We only talk about BR Ambedkar whenever we talk about the Constitution but Ambedkar himself acknowledged the contributions made by BN Rau, who was a Brahmin.”

Rau was an adviser to the Constituent Assembly that drafted the Constitution.

Trivedi courted controversy in 2018, too, when he said Ambedkar was Brahmin, just like Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “I have no hesitation in saying Ambedkar is a Brahmin. His surname, Ambedkar, a Brahmin surname, was given by his teacher, a Brahmin. Not wrong to call a learned person a Brahmin. In that context, I will say (Prime Minister Narendra Modi) ji is also a Brahmin.”

In April 2017, BJP leader Vijay Bansal, then the MLA from Bharatpur in Rajasthan, said, “Bhim Rao Ambedkar was made the creator of Constitution by political people to garner votes.” After protests by Dalit organisations, the state BJP distanced itself from the remark. Then state BJP spokesperson Ashok Lahoty said in a statement, “This statement can be a personal statement by MLA Vijay Bansal. The party has nothing to do with this statement.”

Opposition’s criticism

The Centre has been observing Constitution Day on November 26, the day the Constitution was adopted, since 2015, to commemorate Ambedkar.

The BJP’s celebration of Ambedkar and observing Constitution Day on November 26 has often come under fire from Opposition parties that claim that the ruling party is being disingenuous.

Last year, several Opposition parties, including the Congress, boycotted a Constitution Day event at Parliament’s Central Hall, saying the government was disrespecting the fundamental values of the Constitution and undermining parliamentary democracy. This year, there was no all-out criticism of the government from Opposition leaders, except Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and the Congress’s Jairam Ramesh.

Vijayan tweeted on the occasion, “India’s Constitution, which encompasses the ideals of our anti-imperialist struggle, is facing a wide array of challenges on this 73rd anniversary of its adoption.”

Ramesh claimed that the “ideological fountainheads” of the BJP had nothing to do with the making of the Constitution and said, “Ideological fountainheads of the BJP had nothing whatsoever to do with the making of the Constitution. In fact, the RSS was opposed to the Constitution of India. Desperately wanting to show that he respects the Constitution – while he subverts it daily in letter and spirit – the prime minister decided to celebrate November 26 as Constitution Day. This is sheer hypocrisy.”