Bhagwan Das (1927–2010): Ambedkarite, Buddhist, and Fighter for Dalit Rights

 

Bhagwan Das (1927–2010): Ambedkarite, Buddhist, and Fighter for Dalit Rights

By Maren Bellwinkel-Schempp

Translated from German to English

                                                         

Bhagwan Das was born in 1927 in Shimla. He belonged to the Chuhra or Lal Beghi community, as the street sweepers and latrine cleaners of Punjab are called, named after the rebellious prophet of the Bhangis. The term "Bhangi" itself is derogatory, literally meaning those who consume bhang (cannabis) as an intoxicant.

During colonial times, some of them were closely associated with the British-Indian military. Lal Beghis were employed as servants, cleaners, and also as waiters and cooks in the military. These roles allowed them to bypass some of the discrimination inherent in the traditional caste system. Bhagwan Das grew up in a garrison where his father worked at the telegraph office. The family could afford to send their children to good private schools with English as the medium of instruction. This quality education enabled him to join the Royal Indian Air Force at the age of 16 after completing his matriculation (10th grade) in 1943. At that time, British India was embroiled in World War II, with the Imperial Japanese Army, supported by the Indian National Army, attempting to advance into the Indian heartland from the eastern front. Bhagwan Das was trained and deployed for the newly developed radar surveillance. His excellent command of English allowed him to get along well with British comrades and officers, earning their respect. He would have liked to stay in the Royal Air Force after the war, but his family could not afford the 5,000 rupees required for an officer’s commission.

Ambedkarite and Buddhist

Bhagwan Das had heard of Babasaheb Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, the great statesman and leader of the Untouchables, during his school years. In 1943, he had the opportunity to meet Ambedkar in Shimla for the first time. This encounter led to an enduring connection, culminating in Das serving as Ambedkar’s private secretary in 1955–56. Bhagwan Das offered to assist Ambedkar with compiling his writings, speeches, and lectures, working a few hours a day without compensation. This work, interrupted by Ambedkar’s death in 1956, later resulted in a four-volume publication, Thus Spoke Ambedkar, published by Das between 1963 and 1980 in Jalandhar through Bhimpatrika Press, run by Lahori Ram Balley. This publication is significant as one of the first collections of Ambedkar’s works, long before the Maharashtra government published Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar’s Writings and Speeches.

As a young man, Bhagwan Das was strongly influenced by Christian missionaries. He openly shared how he would visit a Methodist missionary every morning to pray before going to work. Remarkably, he noted that the missionary never pressured him to convert to Christianity.

In the months following Bhagwan Das’s death on November 18, 2010, at the age of 83, numerous obituaries have highlighted his significant contributions to the Dalit movement in India. He was undoubtedly one of the most important figures in the Dalit movement in North India, playing a key role in spreading Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar’s ideas. His great achievement was making the movement accessible to those at the very bottom of the “Untouchable” castes: latrine cleaners and street sweepers. Additionally, he successfully internationalized the issue of “Untouchability,” notably by advocating for the Burakumin in Japan, a group similarly discriminated against as India’s street sweepers and latrine cleaners.

Several years before Dr. Ambedkar’s famous conversion to Buddhism in October 1956, Bhagwan Das had already embraced Buddhism, influenced initially by Bodhanand Mahastavir (1874–1952) in Lucknow and a group of Buddhists in Delhi, originally inspired by the Arya Samaj in Punjab. This group held regular weekly prayer and sermon sessions at the Ambedkar Bhawan and in private homes.

Bhagwan Das recounted how, in Lucknow, a group of Buddhists, led by Pragyanand, arranged his marriage to a well-educated woman from the Dhanuk caste—“for my own good,” as he emphasized. This was likely one of the first Buddhist weddings among Dalits and was notable for being a cross-caste marriage. The Dhanuk are a smaller Untouchable caste, often working as pig herders or vegetable farmers. Bhagwan Das’s wife was a primary school teacher, supporting the family while he pursued law studies and later became a lawyer. They had two daughters and a son. Their eldest daughter, Zoya Hadke, is a senior civil servant in the Indian Administrative Service; their son, Rahul Das, is a doctor; and their younger daughter, Shura Darapuri, is a professor at the BBAU University of Lucknow, dedicated to publishing her father’s works in 23 volumes.

Thirst for Knowledge and Struggle

Like his father, Bhagwan Das was driven by a thirst for knowledge. Following the example of his mentor, Babasaheb Dr. Ambedkar, he bought many books and read extensively, including entire encyclopedia articles in libraries to deepen his understanding of specific topics. For Dalits, who were traditionally excluded from knowledge under the Brahmanical caste system and relegated to servitude, access to education was of immense importance. It was not just about understanding the world but about changing it and securing a rightful place for Dalits in the democratic and socialist independent India. For both Bhagwan Das and Ambedkar, this was a lifelong mission.

In his later years, Bhagwan Das lived with his wife (who passed away a few years earlier), his son Rahul, daughter-in-law, and two grandchildren in a small fourth-floor apartment in Munirka, a settlement developed by the Delhi Development Authorities near Jawaharlal Nehru University. Whenever I visited Delhi in recent years, I stopped by to see him. He was unpretentious, requiring only a phone call to arrange a visit. Guests were received in his living and working room, filled floor-to-ceiling with books, mostly legal texts. Conversations always went straight to the point, focusing on the situation of Dalits, the Buddhist movement, and human rights. He was an inspiration and source of knowledge for many academics and activists, including Walter Hahn, coordinator of the Dalit Solidarity Platform, social scientist Martin Fuchs, and Indologist Heinz Werner Wessler.

Internationalization

Bhagwan Das’s major contribution was internationalizing the Dalit issue. As a Buddhist, he was a founding member of the World Conference of Religions for Peace (WCRP), established in Kyoto in 1969 and meeting every four years. Ambedkar had sought to place the Dalit issue in a global context, comparing Dalits to slaves in the Roman Empire or Black communities in American ghettos, though these analogies were imprecise. Bhagwan Das, however, made a significant impact in 1979 at a WCRP conference in Princeton by comparing the plight of Dalits in India to that of the Burakumin in Japan. The Burakumin, traditionally confined to segregated neighborhoods, were assigned “dirty” jobs like waste disposal and carcass processing, excluded from education, and considered impure—paralleling the situation of Dalits.

In August 1983, supported by several Dalit organizations, Bhagwan Das testified before the United Nations Subcommission on Human Rights in Geneva about the ongoing discrimination against Dalits, challenging India’s official stance that such discrimination, prohibited by the Constitution and laws, was an internal matter. He also played a leading role in the International Dalit Conference in Kuala Lumpur in 1998, a precursor to the World Conference Against Racism in Durban (South Africa, August 31–September 7, 2001).

Bhagwan Das was closely linked to the beginnings of the German Dalit Solidarity movement. In 1993, under the aegis of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation in Bonn, a conference was held on the situation of former “Untouchables” in India, attended by Dalit representatives from Christian, Muslim, Sikh, and Buddhist communities. Bhagwan Das represented the Buddhists, and during this event, the Dalit Solidarity People was founded, marking the first Indian coalition with international support. This set the model for subsequent networks, culminating in the establishment of the International Dalit Solidarity Network (IDSN) in 2000.

In 2001, three years after the formation of India’s National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR), the German Dalit Solidarity Platform was established, initially hosted by the Protestant aid organization Bread for the World, and now a permanent institution. Key figures like Ruth Manorama, S.K. Thorat, and Martin Macwan carried forward Bhagwan Das’s legacy.

His most significant book, Main Bhangi Hoon (I Am a Bhangi), written in Hindi, is a fictional social history of street sweepers. It vividly describes how Bhangis were oppressed, displaced from their land, and rendered homeless through wars and devastation over millennia. Despite being marginalized, Bhagwan Das shows, they retained their pride and ethos. This was undermined by the Arya Samaj’s shuddhi (purification) campaigns, which sought to assimilate them into a conformist Hinduism, renaming them “Valmikis” to tie them to a Brahmanical tradition. Bhagwan Das vehemently opposed this, advocating for an emancipatory Buddhism inspired by Ambedkar.

In 2005, Walter Hahn, the longtime coordinator of the Dalit Solidarity Platform, invited Bhagwan Das to the annual conference in Bonn, followed by a lecture at Bonn’s Indology Department. This was a moving experience for Das, as Babasaheb Dr. Ambedkar had enrolled at the University of Bonn in 1921 to study economics and hoped to learn Sanskrit under the renowned Indologist Hermann Jacobi—a pursuit denied to him in India as a Dalit. Though Ambedkar’s plans were thwarted by lack of time and funds, Bhagwan Das was impressed by documents from Ambedkar’s time in Bonn, including a handwritten letter in German. He marveled at the Sanskrit collection in the university library. A visit to Bonn’s Haus der Geschichte sparked discussions on the culture of remembrance, noting the scarcity of museums or memorials dedicated to Dalit oppression and the Dalit emancipation movement in South Asia.

Even in 2005, it was evident that the strength of this lifelong fighter for Dalit human rights was waning. Yet, he remained lean and active, rising early to work and rejecting retirement. Full of plans for further publications, he regularly attended events at the Panchasheela Institute, which he co-founded in Munirka, and welcomed friends, journalists, and scholars in his modest study. Some projects, including a planned sequel to his fictional history of the Bhangis, remained unfinished. However, he lived to see the publication of his memoirs, In Pursuit of Ambedkar. A few months later, on November 18, 2010, Bhagwan Das—one of the last to have personally known and been directly inspired by Babasaheb Dr. Ambedkar—passed away.

Buddhist Connection of Golagokarnnath Temple

 

Buddhist Connection of Golagokarnnath Temple

SR Darapuri I.P.S.(Retd)

(Note : The Golagokarnath temple located in Kheri  district of Uttar Pradesh is a famous Shaivite temple. It is also called Chhoti Kashi. But in the District Gazetteer of Kheri district published in 1905, its reference is given below, according to which this temple has Buddhist connection. The mention of this temple in the gazetteer is given below.)

(Ref: Kheri: A Gazetteer, Volume XLII of the, District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Avadh by H.R.Nevill I.C.S., Allahabd, Printed by F. Luker, Supdt. Govt. Press, United Provinces. 1905)

Page 184-185-186

Gola, Pargana Hyderabad, Tehsil Muhamdi.

A small but famous town in the north-east corner of the pargana, lying in latitude 28o6’ north and latitude 80o 28’ east, on the north side of the main road from Lakhimpur to Muhamdi, at a distance of 22 miles from the district headquarters. Branch roads lead north-west to Khutar in Shahjahanpur, north to Bhira, and north-east to Aliganj. Less than a mile to the east of the town is the railway station. The population in 1891 numbered 4,311 souls and at the last census had risen to 4,913, of whom 3,700 were Hindus, 1,133 Musalmans and 20 Christians and others. Gola is administered under the provisions of Act XX of 1856, which was applied in 1905, and contains a police station, dispensary, post office, cattle- pond, and a large upper primary school. Markets are held here twice a week, and the place is one of the principal trade centres of the district.

The town is picturesquely situated on some small hills, on the bank of the vanished river Ganga, whose course is marked by a ridge of sand stretching away to south. The bazar lies to the west, and here a busy trade is carried on in grain and sugar. To the east is the celebrated temple of Gokarannath, and its great tank, round which are clustered the many smaller temples, dharamshalas, and the monasteries of Gosains. Gola is one of the most sacred spots in Oudh, and here an immense assemblage, aggregation on an average some 150,000 persons congregate twice annually in Phagun and Chait for fifteen days on each occasion. Pilgrims and traders come hither from long distances, travelling by road and rail; many bring Ganges water to pour over the famous lingam of Mahadeo in the great temple. Their offerings are taken by the priests, but a cess of one anna in the rupee is levied by Government to defray the expenses of the fair management.

The place is of extreme antiquity, but little remains to interest the archaeologist. Originally Gola was doubtless a centre of Buddhist worship; traces of this religion are still seen in several bas-reliefs built into the temple walls, and in the neighbourhood terra-cotta images of pure Buddhist types have from time to time been found. Possibly, too, the Gosains and their monasteries are an evolution from Buddhist priesthood. The temple of Mahadeo is a shivala of the ordinary type, with this peculiarity that it stands below the level of the surrounding ground, the lingam standing in a kind of well about four feet deep. This temple is supposed to be the central spot of a large tract of sacred ground. There are four gates on the borders of this holy land, at an equal distance of twelve kos or eighteen miles from the centre. These are at Deokali in the east, Shahpur on the north, Mati in Shahjahanpur on the west and Barkhar on the south. At Deokali there is still a Surajkund, a tank built in honour of the sun, at which religious assemblies take place, and possibly, in days previous to Buddhism, Gola was a centre of sun worship. Through one of these gates all pilgrims are supposed to pass before approaching the shrine.

The tombs of Gosains are small structures with fluted cupolas, and are evidently taken from the pattern of Buddhist stupas. They are supposed to be celibates and are buried, as usual, in sitting postures. Most of the tombs stand close to the great tank, a masonary structure surrounded by flights of steps coming down to the water.

The ancient history of Gola is now merely a matter of tradition. According to the Gosains the image of Mahadeo came here by accident. When the giant Ravana was attempting to carry Mahadeo to Ceylone, the deity told him that he would only suffer his image to be removed on the condition that it should not touch the ground, as where it should be placed, there it would remain. Ravana accordingly set out and on arriving at Gola, was obliged to entrust his charge to an Ahir boy for a few minutes. The boy grew tired and placed the stone on the ground, where it remained, and Ravana on his return was unable to move it. The origin of the tank and the brick cylinder in the centre, whence the water-supply is maintained is said to be as follows: - A young Brahmin girl happened one day to kill a calf, and in horror at the deed ran off to hang herself, choosing by chance the tree that grew over the stone of Gola. By her actions she disturbed the deity, who bade her leave him in peace and go dig in a spot hard by. She went to the relations and told her story. They helped her to dig and, after making a deep excavation, found the calf buried alive. The hole became the source of the tank. The water-supply is very scanty and the tank has no outlet, so that the water becomes dull green colour and very impure. After one of the big festivals, it is absolutely filthy; respectable pilgrims indeed decline to bathe in it, and instead put a drop of water on their forehead, a ceremony called marjan, which is held to be equally efficacious.

The lingam is a round stone, probably a portion of a Buddhist pillar. It bears the mark of a heavy blow caused according to one account, by the thumb of Ravana, or else, a more probable account, by the mace of an iconoclast Musalman. The story goes that Aurangzeb attempted to pull up the stone with chains and elephants, but without avail, and that when the emperor approached the spot flames burst out of the ground, and the dismayed monarch consequently endowed the shrine with extensive rent-free land.

How to be a Good Buddhist?

 

                                How to be a Good Buddhist?

                            by Bhagwan Das

                         

I have borrowed nothing excepting title from Liu Shao Chi, the famous Chinese leader and author of the book ‘How to be a good Communist?’ which converted thousands to Communism. Besides the ‘Communist Manifesto’ and the ‘Das Kapital’ perhaps the Emile Burns ‘What is Marxism’ is perhaps another world-famous book which appealed to the educated people and explained Communism and clarified doubts. Sydney Webbs ‘World Communism’ has its own place in the Communist Literature of the world. But for common people I think no other book can surpass Liu Shao Chi’s ‘How to be a good Communist?’

I have traveled through almost all parts of India and wherever I go young men put questions about Buddhism? Why did Babasaheb Ambedkar choose Buddhism? ‘Can religion be the panacea of ills?’ ‘Why are the young Buddhists in Buddhist countries turning to Communism? What does Buddhism mean to us?’ ‘What must we follow as Buddhists?’ Many more difficult questions are put and repeated at different places. I am not going to answer all or any one of these questions in this paper. I am simply trying to explain, as best as l can, how to be a Buddhist? I am not following the pattern adopted by Liu Shao Chi but putting it in my own manner keeping in view the circumstances in which we are placed in India.

To start with we must clearly understand that Buddha was the greatest religious teacher in the real sense of the word. He was a teacher and not a prophet, messiah, ‘son of god’ or’ ‘incarnation   born to liberate the erring masses’ or ‘to save deteriorating ‘dharma’.  He was not a ‘yogi’ who could create a following by working miracles and curing the sick. He was a teacher of morality and adopted education as his weapon for ameliorating the suffering masses. He did not promise salvation or a comfortable place in heaven nor freedom from rebirth. His teaching was more earthly and easy to understand. The only difficulty was practising his religion. ‘Panch Sheel’, ‘Four Noble Truths’ and ‘Ashtang Marg’ contain the essence of his teachings. You may and may not read the Dhammapada; you may not be conversant with ‘Tripitaka’;  you may or may not be able to recite thc Suttas in Pali, if you know the meanings of Panch Sheel, understand the significance of Four Noble Truths and follow ‘Eightfold Path’, it is sufficient to make you religious and a ‘man’ in the real sense of the word Buddha wanted man to be a ‘man’ and not merely a ‘biped’ interested only in eating, drinking or procreating.

“Buddha,” to use the words of Tanaka Devi, famous author of ‘Seven Courses of Civilisation’ ‘‘was not a Buddhist; nor for that matter was Christ a Christian and Mohammed a Mohammaden. It was the followers who made them Buddhist, Christian and Mohammedan. In most cases it was the politician and warrior who killed the spirit of religion and began to worship the shell for his own purpose. He exploited religion for his own advantage. Religion gradually became the hand-maid of politician and warrior. It is the ignorant who becomes the most fanatic fighter in defence of religion and political creed. It is at the same time strength and the greatest weakness of any ideology. A small minority of people are seriously interested in religious theory. Majority of the people are never seriously interested in religion or any political theory. They lack the will and the competence to comprehend. Instead of elevating themselves they try to bring the level of the religion down to their feet. What they cannot understand or find difficult to practice they discard. They accept and practice what is easy to comprehend and follow and give them pleasure. Religions which have chalked out an easy path for the masses become more popular than those which demand study, practice, sacrifice, and knowledge.

The easiest to follow is Hinduism. To use the words of Eliot, “it is a jungle.” You are free to believe or disbelieve anything. What is required is conformity with rituals and customs, caste and ceremonies and willingness to call him a Hindu. Among the organized religions, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam some semblance of discipline is maintained. But majority of the Christians and Moslems do not care for their religions. Like the followers of other religions, they also believe that merely following of age old customs is the religion. Most of the troubles have been created by religions and religious leaders themselves. We do not know whether Christ said so or not but Christian books say that ‘no man can enter the kingdom excepting through me.’ Krishna of the Bhagwat Gita said, ‘‘I am God. Come to me and follow and do anything in my name and I shall save you.” He claimed to be God, the saviour.

A good Christian is one who believes in the word of God as embedded in the Bible, has faith in Lord Jesus Christ and accepts him as his saviour. A person may be very moral but if he does not believe in the Bible and does not accept Lord Jesus Christ as his saviour, he is not considered a good Christian. Similarly, a good Mohammedan is one who believes in God as well as in the Koran, accepts Prophet Mohammed as last Prophet sent by God with his message, prays five times a day, visits Mecca. For a Hindu to be a good Hindu there are no commandments to follow and no hard and fast rules. He may be an atheist or agnostic, he may be idolatrous, theist or an iconoclast; he may or may not believe in any book, scripture, religious teaching, or philosophy, he can be a Hindu perhaps a good one, too, if he belongs to a caste and follows dictates of his caste. He must believe in caste system.

On the other hand, a good Buddhist is not one who recites the Suttas correctly, burns candles and joss sticks before the image of the Buddha, goes on pilgrimage to the sacred places like Sarnath, Shravasti, Gaya and Kusinara; bows reverently before the Bhikshus, occasionally gives ‘Dana’, and sleeps with the satisfaction that he has done his duty towards Dhamma. Buddhism, unlike other religions does not believe in God, his prophets, incarnations, salvation, hell and heaven, redemption and forgiveness, prayers, fasts, sacrifices meaningless rituals.

Buddhism is not the faith. It is a religion of morality and practice. Buddha at no time claimed to be omniscient nor gave under importance to his own teachings. “Everything changes,” he said, “for change is the law of nature.” He laid down a criterion for judging his teachings. He also laid down certain principles. He exhorted people not to accept anything on faith. His religion was for the good of many and for the good of all. His religion was not the end in itself but only an aid to elevate oneself. Likening the ‘Dhamma’ to a boat, he said that the boat’s place was in water and the purpose was to carry the passengers across the river. He despised those who carried the boat over their heads.

‘Trisharna’, ‘Panch Sheel’ and ‘Ashtang Marg’ were the important pillars of his religious teachings. They are simple to recite but difficult to comprehend and translate into action. Yet they were not the ‘commandments’ but only teaching willingly accepted. Violation was not visited by curses and scourges. Bad deeds, born of evil thoughts led to suffering. Good deeds invariably led to good results. We cannot remove the pain caused by evil deeds nor can we efface the evil effects of sinful deeds. At best we can minimize the effects of evil deeds by doing good deeds in abundance. If each one of us thinks good of our neighbours and do good, the result would be good and happiness all around. Mind not body commands. Mind has to be controlled and cultivated. Mind controls the body. Body does not control the mind. Knowledge alone is not considered enough. It is the right action with right intention which matters most.

There are millions of nominal Christians, Mohammedans, Sikhs, Shintoist, Taoists, Zoroastrians and Confucius. Likewise, there are millions of nominal Buddhists who have inherited their religion like the property of their ancestors or parents. They may not always be good representatives of their religions.

A good Buddhist is one who is striving to attain a higher standard of culture, is truthful, honest, upright courageous, compassionate, and tolerant. He must have a very high standard of morality. He must try to elevate himself as well as those around him. No man can be truly great in isolation. Buddhism is opposed to individualism. A good Buddhist cannot be selfish. He cannot be dogmatic.  He is a rational person with compassion and loving kindness for all.

One can be a good Buddhist if one reads the books of the Dhamma and ponders over the truth imparted by the Buddha. He must learn to meditate and assimilate the noble teachings of the Buddha. He must earnestly try to translate those noble and lofty principles into everyday life.  He must remain vigilant and not accept everything written in books on faith. He must judge whether it is good for his self as well for the many.

It is good at the beginning, good in the middle and good at the end.

Deeds speak louder than the words. One must always be guarded in his thoughts, deeds and words. When in doubt one should always flash the torch of Dhamma and see whether the particular act would be in accord with the teachings of the Dhamma.

A good Buddhist must always remain vigilant and avoid such acts as are likely to bring bad name to the Dhamma, his teacher Lord Buddha and the Sangha.

Religious societies are judged by their practices and not through their professions.

If we do not keep only the interest of all ‘self’ in mind but work for the betterment and happiness of many, keeping the ideal of removing the suffering of all living beings through service and loving kindness we can make this place a true heaven much better and more real than what the imagination of poets and philosophers have created or presented in their poems and books. This should be the ideal of a good Buddhist. Whoever works for attaining this ideal through right means in accord with the teaching of the Buddha is a good Buddhist.

Bheem Patrika: Dec, 1973, Vol. 2. 

Late Sh. Bhagwan Das was a true Ambedkarite. He gave the slogan “Dalits of the World Unite!”.He was a crusader for internationalization of the issue of Untouchability. He presented this issue including that of Burakumins of Japan in the UNO in 1983. He worked as Assistant to Dr. BR Ambedkar for good time. He compiled and edited “Thus Spoke Ambedkar” in four volumes in the seventies.