DALITS ALONE CAN LIBERATE DALITS

It is an irrefutable historical fact that the sole cause of the unending sufferings of the Untouchables (dalits) & other oppressed masses of India is caste system of Hinduism. Is it not the caste that kept them away from the places of worship, learning, culture and education? Caste denied them all sources and means of subsistence. It denied them water, access to roads and village pathways. Nay, it made them Untouchables. And it is the caste that made them the lowest of the low and poorest of the poor. It made them the target of tyranny and treachery from those who are above them. More than a quarter of a century has lapsed since India attained its so-called “Independence.” But a day does not pass in India without murder, arson, rape and depredation being committed against them. All these cruelties which savages dread are taking place in India- in the land of non-violence because of the existence of a religion of caste that legalizes the business of today by the business of yesterday. Led by our Holy Aryans we dalits never found ourselves in the company of freedom and equality. Whom are we waiting for our salvation? History bears out no evidence to show that an oppressed people have ever been emancipated from oppression by their oppressors. Let us listen to what Ambedkar said on this. “Lost rights are never regained by begging and appeals to the conscience of the oppressors but by relentless struggle. Goats are used for sacrificial offerings, not lions”. Our emancipation must be the work of ourselves. It is the prime and bounden duty of every enlightened. intellectual dalit and oppressed Indian to prepare the minds of their ignorant and illiterate comrade for a revolutionary movement based on a revolutionary theory and practice to free themselves from serfdom and servitude. The extent of education (not-bourgeois education) obtained by the masses of oppressed people is one of the deciding factors to win a revolution. Our enemies, our oppressors and exploiters the idle rich live at our expense. our sweat, sucking our blood as we are the producers of wealth for them. Our suffering is the source of their enjoyment just as our work is the source of their enrichment. Deeply routed domination of the high caste Hindus over the helpless and ignorant dalits, tribals. OBCs and oppressed people should be cast off by a revolution which we cannot entrust any longer to India’s “intellectual” caste-the Brahmins- whose only aim in life is to keep its labouring countrymen in a perpetual state of poverty & ignorance for maintaining their own social status & political power in coct. As we know the progenitors and the protagonists of caste will never raise their little finger against it, not to speak of destroying it. Untouchability and caste cannot exist independently of the other. Similarly there can be no untouchability without caste and there can be no caste without untouchability. They came together and they have to disappear together. The tall talk about the removal of untouchability indulged in by the Hindu leaders has been nothing but a big hoax played on the Untouchables with a view to turning their attention from their struggle against the caste which has made India the original home of inequality and oppression, Not a single Hindu leader, the “Mahatma” included, ever spoke a word against the caste. It would be suicidal on our part If we nurture the hope that the very creators of caste would turn out to be its annihilators. Caste is the be all and end all of the Hindus. It breeds the idea of high and low which implanted the idea of pollution from human beings. Caste is not only the enemy of Untouchables, tribals, OBCs and other persecuted minorities of India but it is also the enemy of its unity, strength, prosperity and progress. Hence, our fight for liberation from the thraldom of caste is more serious than our fight for India’s freedom. In our fight for freedom the only weapon in our hands is our firm unity-unity in thought and action. Let us make it certain that we are not dragged back to the caste dungeon on account of our disunity. Our immediate task is to prepare the minds of our people for the coming revolution-the “caste- war” and “class struggle” both should go together. But the main emphasis should be on caste war, l.e. social revolution. Because in India no political or economic revolution can be successful unless it is preceded by a social revolution. The rock bottom of the Indian society (i.e. Hindu society) is the caste the ageold institution of inequality, serfdom and slavery. And unless the people are freed from its tentacles no revolution whatsoever can be possible in India. This is exactly what Dr. Ambedkar and Periyar E. V. Ramaswamy, the two outstanding revolutionaries India has ever seen, have taught us. We must clearly remember here that during the last 2.000 years gever was such an attack made to shatter the caste system as has been done by these two great leaders of the oppressed Indians. Their mission was to fight tyranny, injustice and false traditions and to undo all privileges and release the oppressed people from bond- age. Unless the caste is shattered no progressive idea, not to speak of a revolutionary one, will sprout and grow in India. They have exposed the utter falsehood that lies behind the pernicious Hindu philosophy that implanted the idea of pollution from human beings. There is not only inequality in Hindu society but in- equality is the official doctrine of the Hindu philosophy. Every political party In India, which invariably is led by Brahmins or upper caste Hindus tainted with the spirit of Brahminism, has betrayed the Indian revolution. The Communists everywhere in the world, as laid down in their manifesto, are expected to support every revolutionary movement against the existing social and political order of things. But Indian Communists have proved by their own policy and practice that they are not bound by this basic principle. It is now certain that they will not come forward to undertake a fight against the caste. Let us not therefore, trail behind them or any other political party as their camp-fo- flowers, drawing water and hewing wood for them. We only follow a leader who thinks as we think and feel. Ambedkar and Periyar sprang from among us. They lived with us, ate with us and slept with us. They know our thoughts and feelings. They knew our utter poverty and appalling penury end degraded social conditions. They are our true and real leaders. To Gandhi, the removal of untouchability was a stunt and political platform but not a pratctical social programme. We will have to carry out relentless propaganda against the spiritualistic fad and superstitious belief thrust on our people by the caste philosophy which has emasculated and devi- talised them for ages. We want equality in India & to achieve this “chaturvarna (caste system) must be destroyed. The privileges for higher castes and poverty for lower castes must end now and here. We have lost everything because of our disunity. What we have lost, others have gained. Our humiliations are a matter of pride with others. We are made to suffer wants and privations not because it was preordained by god but because of the overpowering tyranny and treachery of those who are above us. We have no lands because others have usurped them. We have no posts and positions because others have monopolised them. Let us not believe in fate. Let us believe in our own strength and self-respect. This is what our leaders have taught us. Let us study the Indian situation and surroundings with our own eyes. In India, no kind of inequality can be shattered unless every kind of Inequality existing here is shattered. For us inequality means first caste. For this let us not wait for the day of Indian insurrection to be proclaimed by the crowing of the cock of Aryavratha. Let us unite, organise and move forward to reach our goal. We have nothing to lose but our humiliation. We have to win a world of equality. Arise | Awake II And stop not till the goal is reached.