Talks of Dr. Ambedkar with the Editor, “Sunday Observer”, Madras on 23.9.1944.
As far as | have been able to study, the advent of the Non-Brahmin Party has been an event in the history of India. Many people had not even been able to realize that the fundamental basis of the non-Brahmin. Party was not the communal aspect which the word non-Brahmin indicated. No matter who ran the Non- Brahmin Party, whether it was what they called the ‘intermediate class’s which lay between the Brahmins at one end and the untouchables at the other. Therefore, everybody who believed in democracy had a deep concern in the interests and fortune of the party. The organization of the Non-Brahmin Party was an event in the history of the country. Its downfall was also equally an event to remember with a great deal of sorrow. Why the party crumbled in the 1937 elections was a question that the leaders of the party should assess themselves. Firstly, they had not been able to realize exactly what their differences were with brahminical sections. Though they indulged in virulent criticism of Brahmins, could any one of them say that those differences had been doctrinal? How much Brahminism had they in them? They wear ‘Namams’ and regarded themselves as second class Brahmins. Instead of abandoning Brahminism they had been holding on to the spirit of it as being the ideal they ought to reach. And their anger against Brahmins was that they (the Brahmins) gave them only a second-class degree. How could a party take roots when its followers did not know in clear terms 16 Dalit Voice what were their doctrinal difference between the party to which they belonged and the party to which they – were asked to oppose. So, the failure to enunciate the doctrine of differences between the brahminical sections and the non-Brahmins was one of the reasons for the downfall of the party. The second reason for the downfall of the party was its very narrow political programmes. The party had been described by its opponents as a party of job-hunters. That was the term the ‘Hindu’ had often used. | do not attach much importance to this criticism; for “If we are job-hunters, then the other side are no less than we are”. One defect in the political programme of the: Non-Brahmin Party had been that the party made it its chief concern for secure a certain number of jobs for their young men. That was perfectly legitimate. But did non-Brahman young men for whom the party fought for twenty years io secure jobs in public services remember the party after they had received emoluments for their jobs? During the twenty years the party had been in office, it forgot the 90% of the non-Brahmins living in the villages, leading an uneconomical life and getting into the clutches of the money lenders. | have been greatly pained by the turn of the events. One thing | would like to impress was that a party was the id thing that would save them. A party needed a good leader, a party needed an organization, party needed a political platform. Therefore, | would say to the Non-Brahmins, “Unity is of supreme importance. Learn the lesson before it is too late”. (Bahujan Voice April 14, 1990)
