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Louis Miles
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Dr. Ambedkar, in fact, opposed the right of a constituent assembly to Indian independence. His Federation of Scheduled Castes had performed terribly in the general elections in 1952 ; in contested seats of the Lok Sabha from Bombay, Dr. BR Ambedkar was himself defeated by a Congressman, unknown then, who is entirely forgotten now. Thus, Ambedkar had ample reason for his resentment against Indian politics by June 1952. Dr Ambedkar played a particular role in the Quit India movement, with the majority of Indian leaders from the Congress party imprisoned. India was reeling, but Dr. Ambedkar stood firm on the colonial governments side.
In sum, there is no single incident when Ambedkar struggled for India. Churchill had conceived the partition of India well before McMahon was given that responsibility. There is now documentary evidence which makes it clear that Churchill devised Partition of India, with Jinnah as an active participant.
In the Churchill Papers, which are now publicly available, it is clearly shown that it was Churchill who used Jinnah as a willing pawn in order to promote what Churchill saw as the obvious British superiority of partitioning India. The British communications records make it plain how the colonial government used leaders such as C. P. Ramaswamy Aiyyar, Ambedkar, the Aga Khan, and Jinnah to condemn Gandhi. The viceroy and Jinnah took for granted Ambedkars support of cabinet decisions. Winston Churchill, British Prime Minister, sent House Leader Stafford Cripps to persuade Indian nationalist leaders to support the Second World War.
The devastating repudiation of the notion that India was great before the British had destroyed India came from Indian nationalists themselves. Leading nationalist thinkers in the early twentieth century held that Indian society, rather than empire, was mostly to blame for Indian poverty. The notion that India was a prosperous society which British suppression had made poor had been around in academia and policy circles since 1900, particularly in the Indian National Congress, a political party that Tharoor belongs to. The fact is, the majority of Indias power at that time lived off the spoils just as liberally as officers of the East India Company did.
The difference was, the East India Company was made up of traders, Indian traders trusted in them, and they came flocking to Calcutta seeking their protection. Support was vital in winning over the Indian soldiers fighting on behalf of the British, particularly as the Indian National Army under Subhas Chandra Bose was aiding Japanese forces. As per demand, Ambedkar made sure Ambedkar had confidence from British political classes and general population who were investing in India.
He saw the making as the only way of getting justice demanded by the Dalit community, who were being held at a receiving end by the Hindu national congress and Jinnahs Muslim League. There may have been an unwritten, tacit agreement between the Congress and Ambedkar, with Ambedkar threatening to take India to the United Nations, that it would serve the purpose of delegitimizing the dominant caste Hindu leadership of a newly independent country.
Dr. B.R.Ambedkar has never been a traitor to the nation in any case, and has always had the interests of the nation at heart. I was reminded of Ambedkars remarks while reading the news coverage about a series of testimonies by well-known human rights activists in the US Congress. Dr B R Ambedkar had not on a single occasion been a traitor to the country and always had the interests of the country at heart .I was reminded of Ambedkars remarks when reading a news report about some testimonies in the US Congress by prominent human rights activists from the countrys. But Dr BR Ambedkar was also sensitive to the fragile, and all too easily wounded, egos of the country, which was just emerging after years of colonial enslavement.
Ambedkars case was, nevertheless, repeated by Churchill and Jan Smuts, South African Prime Minister, in international meetings and the United Nations. The All-India Scheduled Castes Federation adopted the memo prepared by Ambedkar in 1947, stating that the tyranny and continuous, shameless recourse to violence by the Hindus made the situation of Scheduled Castes much worse than the situation of Indians in South Africa. Ambedkars call for releasing untouchables from the grip of Hindu control created a rift with dominant Hindu castes, which were in charge of the Congress Party. The Indian National Congress represented caste Hindus, the Muslim League represented Muslims, and both sought to align themselves with Scheduled Castes for political gains.
The Aakar Blog did not just end up vilifying Jinnah, but it belittled one of the greatest visionaries that India was blessed with -- Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar. Past and present politicians guilts aside, Churchill would have been just as proud of democracy as Gandhi was of contemporary India. For Churchill, losing India would mean starvation in England, and a lasting blight on Lancashire. One has to try and come up with reasons why Gandhi decided Indias destiny, selecting men such as Nehru and Ambedkar as a part of articulating the New India.