Dalit Politics Needs a New Radical Agenda

 

Dalit Politics Needs a New Radical Agenda

-         S.R. Darapuri, National President, All India Peoples Front

Dr. Ambedkar is considered the father of Dalit politics. He was the first to form the Independent Labour Party in 1936, the Scheduled Castes Federation in 1942, and the Republican Party of India (RPI) in 1956.  A notable aspect of these parties was that, except for the Scheduled Castes Federation, none of them were caste-based. The agenda of all these parties was broad, with the Dalit agenda at its core. It is also true that Dr. Ambedkar never sought votes in the name of caste, except for the Scheduled Castes Federation. After Dr. Ambedkar's death, from 1957 to 1962, the RPI continued to practice agenda-based politics, and its achievements were quite significant. However, later, the Congress lured Dalit leaders away, and the RPI fragmented into several pieces and disintegrated.

After the disintegration of the RPI, Kanshi Ram formed the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in North India and, by allying with the staunchly anti-Dalit party BJP, formed the government three times and once independently. The biggest weakness of this party was its lack of any agenda or principles. Kanshi Ram proudly used caste to counter caste and was opportunistic. The result of this opportunistic and unprincipled alliance with the BJP was that the BJP continuously grew stronger in North India, while the BSP continuously weakened. Currently, the BSP is fighting for its very existence.

The BSP experiment has made it clear that a party that practices caste politics cannot last long. It is only the agenda and principles that prevent a party from disintegrating. It is also an established truth that caste politics only strengthens Hindutva politics, as has happened currently.

Kanshi Ram called political power the master key, the solution to all problems. In contrast, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar believed "political power cannot be the master key to ending all the miseries of the oppressed class. Their liberation lies in achieving a higher social status." Will you still say that political power is the master key? Experience so far has proven this wrong. Uttar Pradesh is the biggest example of this. It is also true that later Babasaheb also called political power the key to the problems of Dalits, but along with that, he also said that political power should be used for the development of society. But in practice, it has mostly been used for personal development instead of social development. Mayawati is the biggest example of this. Therefore, along with political power, there should also be an agenda for social development, which has been completely missing in Bahujan politics.

Therefore, if Dalit politics is to re-establish itself, it must adopt principled politics and a radical Dalit agenda. The outline of that agenda could be as follows:

1. Poverty and Unemployment: According to the NITI Aayog's 2024 report, 42% of SC Dalit families are below the poverty line, while the national average is 20%. According to PLFS 2023-24, the unemployment rate for SCs is 7.8%, while the national rate is 5.8%. 70% of Dalits are engaged in daily wage labour or agricultural labour.

According to the 2011 census, only 4.88% of Dalits are in government jobs and 2.42% in private jobs. In terms of income, 83.6% of Dalits have a monthly income of less than 5000, 11.7% have an income between 5000 and 10,000, and only 4.7% have an income of more than 10,000.

Therefore, poverty alleviation and unemployment should be the main issues of Dalit politics.

 2. Landlessness: According to the 2011 census, only 18.41% of Dalits own unirrigated land, 17.41% own irrigated land, and 6.98% own other types of land. Of these, 60% of Dalits own less than one acre of land. Thus, most Dalits are small and marginal farmers. In drought-affected areas due to climate change, 80% of the affected farmers are Dalit farmers. Therefore, the issue of land allocation (residential and agricultural land leases) for landless Dalits is extremely important and should be a major political demand.

3. Violence and Atrocities: According to the NCRB 2023 report, 54,750 cases of crimes against Dalits were registered, which is 7% more than in 2022. These include 4,800 rapes and 1,200 murders. More than half of these cases are in Uttar Pradesh (25%), Rajasthan (15%), and Bihar (12%). The conviction rate under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act is only 32%, due to police bias and intimidation of witnesses. Amnesty International (2024) has documented over 200 such cases in Tamil Nadu alone that went unreported. Currently, a crime is committed against a Dalit every 18 minutes, including 13 murders every day. Therefore, the effective implementation of the SC/ST Act to prevent atrocities against Dalits should be on the agenda of Dalit politics.

4. Untouchability and Discrimination: According to NFHS-5 rural data and the India Human Development Survey 2024, 40% of villages report that 25-30% of Dalits face restrictions on entering temples/water sources. Similarly, in cities, according to a 2023 CSDS study, 70% of landlords in Delhi refuse to rent houses to Dalit tenants. The Supreme Court (2024) upheld the sub-categorization of SC quota but stated that "hierarchical inequality" persists. Dalit women face triple discrimination (caste-gender-poverty).

According to the Safai Karamchari Andolan's 2024 report, 50-70 deaths annually due to sewer cleaning, honor killings, and mob lynchings over inter-caste relationships or cow protection are common. Therefore, the issue of eradicating untouchability and discrimination should also be at the centre of Dalit politics.

5. Educational Backwardness: According to the National Census 2011 and NFHS-5, the literacy rate among Dalits is 66.1% while the national rate is 73%. Additionally, the dropout rate for Dalit children after class 8 is twice as high (AISHE 2023). Only 7% of students in higher education are Dalit (AISHE 2023). According to the Ministry of Social Justice's 2023 audit report, 40% of Dalit students experience delays in receiving scholarships, making it very difficult for them to continue their studies. Meanwhile, fees for medical, engineering, and other professional courses have been increased manifold, making it very difficult for Dalit students to afford them. Recently, a large number of schools at the basic and middle levels are being closed in BJP-ruled states, which will deprive Dalit children of education as they cannot afford expensive private schools. The government is rapidly privatizing education, which is a conspiracy to deprive Dalit and other poor children of education. Therefore, there should be a strong opposition to the privatization of education and a demand for increasing the education budget and providing equal quality education to all.

6. Health Services and Health Inequalities: According to the national NFHS-5 report, 60% of Dalit women suffer from anaemia, compared to 53% nationally. For this reason, according to the Lancet (2023) report, the death rate from COVID among Dalits was 1.5 times higher than the general population. Meanwhile, the government is continuously reducing the budget for health services and indirectly promoting privatization. Although the government has implemented the Ayushman Yojana, it is benefiting private hospitals more than the poor. Therefore, instead of the Ayushman Yojana, the government should strengthen public health services, which would benefit all the poor, including Dalits. Therefore, there should be a demand to stop the privatization of health services, strengthen government health services, and increase the number of hospitals and their budget.

In addition to the above, issues such as fair support prices for agricultural produce, stopping the privatization of public sector undertakings, preventing the centralization of capital, raising resources by imposing appropriate taxes on the super-rich to create employment, stopping corporate exploitation, controlling inflation, rationalizing GST, promoting agriculture and agro-industries and cooperative farming, increasing the minimum wage and providing a living wage to workers, instead of giving free rations to 80 crore people, providing them with employment to increase their income, breaking the nexus between Hindutva and Corporates, ending the persecution of minorities, and strengthening education and health services are all issues that concern the general public as well as the Dalit community. Therefore, all these issues should be at the centre of politics. Dalit politics should also raise these issues.

It is well known that the BJP, instead of addressing these public issues, resorts to raising immaterial and emotional issues of religion/community to distract the attention of the common people so that no one questions or demands answers about its 11 years of failures. Therefore, it is essential that all opposition parties, including Dalit parties, raise the above-mentioned public issues and present alternative economic policies and plans. Only by doing so will it be possible to stop the BJP's politics of the Hindutva-Corporate nexus. It is also noteworthy that soft Hindutva and the politics of caste and religion only strengthen Hindutva politics, which must be defeated at all costs.

 All India Peoples Front (Radical) – (AIPF) has been working for a long time on people-centric, issue-based democratic politics and is striving to give concrete shape to a multi-class alliance. Currently, the AIPF, along with other like-minded organizations, is running an Employment and Social Rights campaign, the main objective of which is to bring the issue of employment to the centre of politics. The AIPF firmly believes that if a proper tax is levied on the country's 350 super-rich, the GST is restructured, and the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act is repealed, it would generate enough funds to provide jobs to all the unemployed in the country, in addition to providing funds for MNREGA, education, and health services.

Bahujan politics needs a New Radical Alternative

 

Bahujan politics needs a New Radical Alternative

             - S R Darapuri, National President, All India People's Front

Dr. Ambedkar is considered the father of Dalit politics. He raised the demand for political rights to the Dalits in the Round Table Conferences and despite Gandhiji's strong opposition, the Dalits got the status of a minority class and political rights apart from the Hindus, which were announced in the form of Communal Award. In this, Dalits got the right of separate electorates to choose their own representatives like other minorities like Sikhs and Muslims. Gandhiji opposed it by fasting till death by calling it a conspiracy to divide Hindu society and in the end Dr. Ambedkar had to sign Poona to save Gandhiji's life. Due to this, instead of separate electorates, the Dalits got the facility of reserved seats in the legislature, reservation in government jobs and local bodies and special incentive for education, but the right of independent politics of the Dalits was snatched away.

Dr. Ambedkar formed the Independent Labour Party (Swatantra Mazdoor Party) and participated in the Bombay Presidency in the first election of 1937. His main emphasis in this election was on the issues of the working class. In this they won 15 seats including 3 general seats. After this he formed the All India Scheduled Castes Federation  (SCF) in 1942, whose membership was limited to Dalits only. With this, he contested elections in 1946 and 1952 but he did not get any special success. Finally, on October 14, 1956, he dissolved the Federation and founded the Republican Party of India (RPI). He also framed its constitution.

Now it remains to be seen what was the main vision of Babasaheb behind forming these parties. Let us first look at Babasaheb's Swatantra Mazdoor Party. Dr. Ambedkar, in his statement, while explaining the reasons for the formation of the party and its work, had said- “Keeping in view that today is not the time to organize parties on the basis of sectarianism. Agreeing with the wishes of my friends, the name of the party and its program have been made huge so that political cooperation with other sections of the people can be possible. The main focus of the party will remain only 15 members of the Dalit castes, but people from other classes will also be able to join the party. The politics of this party was not casteist but class and issue based and mainly Dalits were at its centre.

If we look at the purpose and agenda of the All India Scheduled Castes Federation established by Babasaheb in 1942, it is found that Dr. Ambedkar had talked about establishing it as a third party to strike a balance between the ruling Congress and the socialist parties. Its membership was limited to the Depressed Classes only as it was necessary at that time to project the interests of the Depressed Classes.

Babasaheb formed the Republican Party of India (RPI) on October 14, 1956, whose main objective was to create a party that would be according to the promises made in the constitution and its objective was to fulfill them. He did not want to make it a party of untouchables only because a party formed in the name of one caste or class cannot get power. It can only become a pressure group. The main objectives behind the establishment of the RPI were: (1) To remove inequalities from the social system so that no privileged and deprived sections remain, (2) There should be a two-party system: one is the opposite party in power, (3) Equality before the law and there should be same law for all, (4) establishment of moral values ​​in the society, (5) equal treatment to minority people, (6) sense of humanity which has been lacking in Indian society.

The main goal and objective of the party in the preamble of the party's constitution was to achieve "Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity". The program of the party was very wide. Babasaheb's objective behind the establishment of the party was that minority people, poor Muslims, poor Christians, poor and lower caste Sikhs and untouchables of weaker sections, people of backward castes, people of primitive castes, end of exploitation, seeking justice and progress. May all the people of India unite under one flag and stand against the capitalists and defend the Constitution and their rights.” - (Dalit Politics and Organization - Bhagwan Das)

It is clear from the above description that the objective of the political parties founded by Babasaheb was to create a multi-class party which could include Dalits, Backward, Muslims, Workers and Peasants. The agenda of the party was also made on the issues of these sections. The agenda of his parties was not casteist at all.

Now if we look at the current Dalit politics, then politics in the name of Bahujan comes to the fore. Its main father is Kanshi Ram. Kanshi Ram's concept of Bahujan was from an alliance of Dalit, Muslim and other backward castes whom he considered to be 85% of the total population of India and the remaining 15% as upper castes. Hence his Bahujan politics is also known as 15 vs 85. His main agenda was to snatch political power from 15% of the upper castes. This formula sounds great but in practice it is not. The leadership in Kanshi Ram's Bahujan politics was in the hands of the elite people of Dalits, Backward and Muslims. They used to get tickets on the basis of access/money and by winning they became ministers, MLAs and MPs. When the government was formed, it was they who used to take maximum advantage of it. Common Dalits, OBCs and Muslims were only the voters who voted vigorously in the hope that their problems would be resolved if the government was formed. But even after the formation of the BSP government four times, there was no improvement in their material conditions.

The main objective of Bahujan politics was to either capture or share political power. Its policies or agenda were not to replace the policies or agenda of the politics of the present exploiting class. Although Kanshi Ram had given the slogan of change of system, but when he came to power, he did not do anything for it. In fact, he had no alternative policies or agenda of his own which would uplift the common man (Dalit, Backward or Minority or others). The pivot of Bahujan politics was the section of the Depressed Classes who entered government jobs, whose biggest issue was reservation. Therefore, the main agenda of Bahujan politics was also reservation, promotion and good posting etc. Land allotment, employment, education, health and freedom from oppression were not in his agenda for the common Dalit. With Mayawati becoming the Chief Minister four times, they were emotionally appeased and there was some reduction in harassment too, but there was no major change in their condition. In fact, Bahujan politics had no capacity to fight Hindutva and pro-corporate politics and it was bound to decline.

In comparison to Kanshi Ram's Bahujan politics, if Dr. Ambedkar's politics is seen, then at its centre were poor Dalits, poor backward, poor Muslims, labourers and poor farmers. Babasaheb in his Agra speech had expressed deep concern over the landlessness of the Dalits and talked about fighting for getting them land. His aim was to unite these people under the banner of one party and fight for their constitutional rights by raising them against the capitalists and Brahmanism. The main goal of Kanshi Ram was to get power by any means, for which he also took three-time support from the staunch anti-Dalit BJP, due to which Bahujan politics got confused and headed towards its downfall.

Babasaheb had created the Republican Party of India as a big platform in which apart from the Dalits, people from other sections could also participate. Through this, Babasaheb was creating an alternative politics in which the common man was at the centre. The main objective of the party was to create a party which is according to the promises made in the constitution and its objective is to fulfil them. Initially, when the party worked towards these objectives and agenda, it also got very good success in the elections of 1962 and 1967. It also led a huge land movement in 1964-65, which led to the allotment of land to the Dalits. Later this party got divided due to personal interest of some leaders, behind which Congress had a big hand. Congress broke its leaders with the lure of post and now it is divided into many pieces and is ineffective. Nowadays the leaders of Dalit parties also keep changing parties like this for personal gains.

At present, the main representative of Bahujan politics is considered to be the Bahujan Samaj Party. Apart from this, there is Ramdas Athawale's RPI (A) in Maharashtra and Ram Vilas Paswan's Lok  Janshakti Party in Bihar which has alliance with BJP. The agenda of all these parties is only to get power or share in power. They have no policy or agenda different from the ruling party BJP or Congress. That is why they cannot compete with BJP's Hindutva and pro-corporate politics. In these parties, democracy is replaced by authoritarianism and the leadership is in the hands of one person. There is no interference of common man in this. That is why their leaders make alliances with anyone for personal gain, which does not benefit the common man. Dr. Ambedkar had said that political power is the key to all problems. He had further said that political power should be used for the development of the society but the conduct of leaders of Bahujan politics is completely opposite.

Therefore, in view of the above circumstances, in place of the present Bahujan politics, there is a need to develop a new politics of Dalits, backwards and minorities, whose policies and agenda are against the Hindutva and corporate politics of BJP and the attack of global capital. For this, alternative policies like making employment a fundamental right, making education universal, improving health services, stopping privatization, making agriculture profitable, allotting land to the landless, ending corporate monopoly, restoration of democracy, ending black laws and the need for secularism etc. Along with this, democratization of society in which the destruction of caste is prominent also needs to be implemented. The present politics of caste is the promoter of Hindutva itself. Therefore, instead of this, the politics of public issues should be adopted.

Keeping this need of Bahujan politics in view, we formed the All India People's Front in 2013. In the leadership of this party, prominence has been given to Dalits, Adivasis, minorities, most backward and women. Its main goal is to give an embodiment of the concept of Begumpura of Sant Ravidas. This party is in favour of secularism and democracy. Our effort is to create a multi-class party so that intellectuals, social workers and parties of different ideologies can be included in it and with their help the attack of  Hindutva and corporate backed  BJP/RSS and the totalitarianism of financial capital can be stopped. It should be remembered that in the absence of alternative policies and agenda, the present Bahujan politics has failed miserably in this. Therefore, now Bahujan politics needs a new radical alternative.

Let us together honestly build a multi-class politics that can withstand the onslaught of BJP's Hindutva, pro-corporate politics and global finance capital and can fulfill Dr. Ambedkar's dream of establishing a casteless and classless society.