Gandhi came from the Kathiawad peninsula which is toady a part of Gujarat. he
belonged to the Vaishya caste known as the modh Bania. The Bania castes were wealthy,
influential and took tradition seriously. Gandhis father, grand-father and great grandfather
had served as prime-ministers in the princely states of the peninsula.
Gandhi capacity to compromise was developed during his years in South Africa. In
accepting compromise one helped ones opponent not to lose face. it was an honourable
way of resolving problems; for the dignity of all the contending individuals or groups was
preserved. Thus, for example, when Ambedkar accepted to give up his demand for a
separate electorate, Gandhi responded by conceding the claim for reserved seats.
Gandhi disliked conflictual struggle. The style of resolving differences where the two
contending parties had to fight each other so that one of them might win was abhorrent to
him. It has been argued by Lloyd and Susan Rudolph that Gandhis preference for
consensus and distaste for conflict has roots in village society. There was a constant
search for consensus in village affairs and opposition to partisanship. De-emphasising
open clashes, victories and defeats, appeared to be a widely prevalent way of resolving
disputes. We are of the opinion, however, that the dominant castes potential for coercion
contributed to the success of the consensus approach.
One of the references in Gandhi’s autobiography deals with his firmness on the question
of admitting and untouchable family to his ashram near Ahmebadad in 1915. In 1920,
Gandhi said: “Swaraj is unattainable without the removal of the sin of untouchability as
it is without Hindu-Muslim unity. In 1921 he said, “I do not want to be reborn. But if I
have to be reborn, I should be born an Untouchable”.
In 1937 Gandhi said, “One born a scavenger must earn his livelihood by being a
scavenger, and then do whatever else he likes. For a scavenger is as worthy of his hire as
a lawyer or your President. That according to me is Hinduism. “ What is being implied
is that all varnas have equal worth. Seen from another point of view, this would suggest
a denial of equal opportunity: for few people will admit that a scavenger is the equal of a
lawyer or a President in worldly status, Gandhi believed in Varnashramadharma, the
religious division of society into four groups: Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra.
This four-fold ordering of society and the associated traditional duties were important for
the preservation of harmony and the growth of the soul. “The law of Varna prescribes
that a person should, for his living, follow the lawful occupation of his forefathers,”
Stated Gandhi.
We shall now look at Ambedkar’s early years and the gradual hardening of his position
towards Hinduism and caste-Hindu society. To begin with, their was a great difference
in the respective family situations of Ambedkar and Gandhi. While the latter’s
forefathers had served as prime-ministers, the formers grandfather and father had served
in the lower, rungs of the British army. Ambedkars father, Ramji Sakpal was an intensely
religious man. He regularly recited the Ramayana and the Mahabharata to his children.
Inspired by the Bhakti current of kabir and chokhamela, the family sang the praises of
Krishna and Rama. Values of equality before God appear to have played some
importance in this system. His followers believed that caste and rank at birth mattered
little to God. In the army, Ramji ( and his father before him) had been exposed to liberal
English values. Ramji had picked up enough of the English language to impart it to his
son, Ambedkar The fact that the Mahars had been given their own regiment, the 111th
Mahars, contributed to the strengthening of horizontal ties among those of term who were
in the army. Here they were not obliged to observe traditional practices which
symbolised their Untouchability.
Life in the cantonments and in Bombay (where his father moved to during his last years
of High school) permitted the space for young Ambedkar to develop ideas and attitudes
which as village Untouchable youth could scarcely have hoped to arrive at. Thus,
Ambedkar’s childhood and early youth and the following influences: a Bhaktk current
which spoke of the individuals equality before God, the enchantment and inspiration of
the Ramayana and Mahabharata, and the liberal English values which filtered down to
the Mahar regiment. This was also a period when the beginnings of horizontal caste
solidarities and the weakening of behaviour associated with traditional intercaste relations
began to appear. If Ambedkar had grown up in the ideological context of the Untouchable
Mahar quarters of a Hindu village. It is unlikely that he could have developed into the
confident and persevering youth that he became. From the latter part of his childhood
onwards there were several unpleasant incidents which brutally brought home to him that
he was not the social equal of caste Hindus.
Ambedkars earlier attitude to Hinduism was ambivalent. On the one hand, he was
slowly coming to realise that within Hinduism there could be no liberation from
untouchability; on the other, his own upbringing had been within an atmosphere where
the Hindu epics were recited with great devotion. In the early 1920’s he had some faith in
the Untouchables changing their status through emulating higher caste practices. He
gradually came to the conclusion that this process, which sometimes included wearing the
sacred thread and celebrating marriages with Vedic rites, had little effect in changing the
attitudes of caste Hindus. By 1927, his mind was already made up when the Manusmriti
was burnt in his presence at a large public meeting. In 1935, he announced his decision
to leave Hinduism. Where Gandhi’s path was one of rediscovering Hinduism,
Ambedkars was one of bitterness and eventual rejection of the religion of his forefathers.
On October 14th, 1956, Ambedkar renounced Hinduism and embraced Buddhism along
with several hundred thousand of his followers. His choice of this particular religion.
and not any other, was based onto need to bicultural rooted in India. Furthermore, he felt
that Buddhism espoused egalitarian values without resorting to the violent methods of
communism.
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