Posted on 29 November 2011
OPINION
Ram Puniyani
This elephant is cast in stone
Ram Puniyani attempts to decode Mayawati's dalit welfare policies and
their status today
WITH ELECTION looming over the Uttar Pradesh horizon, recently
(November 2011) Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati declared that
her cabinet has approved the proposal to divide the state into four
smaller states. She declared that only a Dalit-OBC chief minister
would be able to solve the problems of Dalits-OBCs. There is also the
talk of giving reservations to Muslims in UP. All this has created a
huge turmoil in political circles. Amongst the politicians who have
succeeded at a fast pace during the past two decades, Mayawati, the
associate of late Kanshi Ram, may be amongst the foremost of them.
While she inherited the movement built by Kanshi Ram, she also
revealed her mettle and grit to capture the seat of power in the
challenging arena of politics. Her prime ministerial ambitions at the
moment are not vocal, though immediately after her absolute majority
win in the previous UP assembly election she sang that note: Dalit ki
beti a prime minister.
Many a times she has been in the news for the wrong reasons; The Taj
Corridor case, her lavish spending on Ambedkar park and getting
numerous statues not only of past Dalit icons like Ambedkar, and
Kanshi Ram, but of herself during the past few years, have hogged
media attention. Her major point of self-proclamation is that all this
expenditure is for the sake of the Dalits. What do Dalits need at this
point of time and in what proportion is an issue to be debated in a
serious manner? Of late Mayawati has been also talking of reservation
on the economic criterion rather than on caste, and from the point of
view of electoral arithmetic she has been wooing the Brahmins, through
Brahmin Bhaichara Sammelans.
Her major adviser has been Satish Mishra, who not only has succeeded
in getting many of his close relatives into plum posts but has also
got a university named after his mother. From her earlier slogan of
Bahujan Samaj, Mayawati has tilted to the slogan of Sarvjan Samaj and
from the shooing away of Brahmins and upper castes she has been
aggressively campaigning to get them in her electoral fold. While the
atrocities against Dalits have shown a downward trend in UP, what is
debatable is the equity issues and the economic empowerment of Dalits,
which have remained in limbo despite her regime being in majority
rule. Dalits in India have gone through a long and painful struggle to
strive for equality and dignity. Ambedkar, the profound scholar,
contributed to all aspects of Dalits' social and political life. He
fought for the rights of Dalits, who until that time were deprived of
education, were mostly landed slaves and were under the grip of temple
priests and lived on the edges of society. His formation of an
independent labour party, a scheduled caste federation and later the
concept of republican party, were the milestones in the process of
organising Dalits. The concretisation of Ambedkars' values was
actualised through his becoming the chair of the drafting committee of
the Indian Constitution. He tactfully handled many vexed issues
related to overall efforts towards the social transformation of caste
in particular. His major focus was: educate, organise and agitate for
the rights of Dalits.
The later period was marked by few agitations and more of political
activity. The remarkable ones' amongst these were the land reform
movement of Dada Saheb Gaikwad and later the formation of Dalit
Panthers by Dalit youths, on the lines of the Black Panthers of the
US. Most of these movements got fragmented and the plight of Dalit
politics became abysmal with the ruling parties trying their best and
succeeding in wooing one or the other Dalit politician. Electoral
confusion was another dimension of their alliances, some of them
tilted towards Congress, while some of them had no compunctions in
allying with avowed Hindutva parties hailing a Hindu Rashtra openly,
allying with the forces eulogising Manusmiriti and a Hindu nation.
Mayawati at one time not only allied with the BJP in UP to come to
power but also went on to campaign for Narendra Modi in in the
aftermath of the Godhra Gujarat carnage.
Around the time when Dalit Panthers were agitating on the streets,
Kanshi Ram began his political journey in a different way. His methods
also ensured that the bane of Dalit politics, fragmentation into
pieces, would not take place. The dissenters were thrown out, and the
dictat of the supreme leader, Kanshi Ram and later Mayawati,
prevailed. Kanshi Ram first started BAMCEF, which was an association
of educated Dalits, who believed in payback to the community. Their
understanding was that they have prospered due to the provision of
reservation for Dalits. Later, Kanshi Ram formed the Bahujan Samaj
Party and in due course Mayawati became his closest associate and
succeeded him as supreme leader once Kanshi Ram fell sick. The second
major thrust of Kanshi Ram and later Mayawati was to come to power
with whatever means and to try to implement their agenda.
DURING THE course of political journey of the BSP, Mayawati kept
climbing the electoral ladders in UP. She struck an alliance with the
RSS progeny BJP. Here, two contrasting forces stood face to face,
Mayawati for the rights of Dalits and BJP for the long term goal of a
Hindu Rashtra, based on Brahmanism. This alliance was like Mayawati
reversing Ambedkar's burning of Manusmriti and openly associating with
the followers of Manu. In the initial days in BSP meetings, this
slogan rung: tilak taraju aur talwar, inko maro joote char (Beat the
upper caste), and, now it is brahman shankh bajyega hathi badhta
jayega (Brahmin will lead, followers of BSP will march).
The elephant, the electoral symbol of the BSP, got recast, hathi nahi
ganesh hai: brahma vishnu mahesh hai. The political ambition of power
has strange logic. Mayawati spends millions on elephant statues, and
thouse of herself. This smacks of identity politics taken to absurd
limits. One concedes that Dalits do need a space in social sphere, and
these statues probably offer them a sense of dignity and belonging.
The question is how much public spending can be allocated to the
statues and how much should be spent for the social welfare of Dalits.
Dalit politics has come to a new crossroads. The core issues of Dalits
remain far from being solved in a substantive way. The problems of
poverty, health and employment need a serious struggle, in case they
are to be addressed. Can power, especially coming to power in this
fashion, be the panacea for Dalit problems? What happens to Ambedkar's
teachings of educate, unite and struggle? This is what needs to be
taken up by those leading the Dalit movement at various levels. Can
just coming to power be a goal in itself, is the question.
Ram Puniyani is a communal harmony activist based in Mumbai.
ram.puniyani@gmail.com
------------------------------------
----
INFORMATION OVERLOAD?
Get all ZESTCaste mails sent out in a span of 24 hours in a single mail. Subscribe to the daily digest version by sending a blank mail to ZESTMedia-digest@yahoogroups.com, OR, if you have a Yahoo! Id, change your settings at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ZESTMedia/join/
PARTICIPATE:-
On this list you can share caste news, discuss caste issues and network with like-minded anti-caste people from across India and the world. Just write to zestcaste@yahoogroups.com
TELL FRIENDS TO SIGN UP:-
If you got this mail as a forward, subscribe to ZESTCaste by sending a blank mail to ZESTCaste-subscribe@yahoogroups.com OR, if you have a Yahoo! ID, by visiting http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ZESTCaste/join/
Also have a look at our sister list, ZESTMedia: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ZESTMedia/Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ZESTCaste/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ZESTCaste/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
ZESTCaste-digest@yahoogroups.com
ZESTCaste-fullfeatured@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
ZESTCaste-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
No comments:
Post a Comment