Why are Dr Ambedkar’s ideas so important to understanding the lives of the oppressed today; not just in India but globally? First, Dr Ambedkar was determined to address social reality as it is not just how we’d like it to be; second, he took the perspective of those at the bottom who are oppressed; and third, Dr Ambedkar insisted that the conditions of the poor were the result not of individual disappointments but of the working of the social system under which they lived. Ultimately the question Dr Ambedkar asks of the downtrodden is not ‘Who are we?’, ‘What is our identity?’ but ‘how are we treated?’; and ‘why?’ And so he tells the world that his people are named as Dalit – the downtrodden, the broken.
I’ve learned two further and important things that follow from Dr Ambedkar’s thought here:
First, he does not separate social inequality from economic inequality, or caste from class. Indeed, Dr Ambedkar was the only person in his time to link the rights of the oppressed classes and the right of Dalits.
Secondly, the oppression of caste cannot be treated as a religious matter separate from society and economy. It is well known how critical Dr Ambedkar was of the Hindu scriptural sanction of caste and varna, but he rejected the idea that untouchability was just a cultural or religious matter.[…] The solution to discrimination lay not in religious reform but in legal rights and state intervention on behalf of the downtrodden. In this sense Dr Ambedkar removed the issue of rights from the realm of Hindu religion. The discrimination he fought against was a violation of civic and human rights in any community, any religion, region or country.
Addressing the needs the marginalised is a commitment of the international Sustainable Development Goals to ‘end poverty in all its forms’, to reduce inequality of opportunity, to provide decent work for all, ending modern forms of slavery and discrimination. I have noted three ways in which Dr Ambedkar can lead the approach to this global challenge: First, policy makers need squarely to face the social realities of continuing inequality, discrimination and marginalisation of certain groups in society, especially on the basis of caste; second, they need to listen to the experience of these groups themselves, and make their concerns part of national priorities; and third, policymakers need to understand that the conditions of the marginalised and exploited are not the result of their individual capacities but the working of social systems that allow discrimination and exclusion of certain categories of people. Dr Ambedkar points to caste as one such system, not only in India but internationally.
Buddhist Ambedkarite Maitry Sangha 