100 Years of Mooknayak, Ambedkar's First Newspaper

Established 1946 1 Pages 20 Price : Rupees Five Vol. 75 No. 3 Why Was Mahatma Gandhi Killed? February 9, 2020 Harish Khare The Time Has Come to Bring Ambedkar and Gandhi Together As is their wont, our new with “the Muslims” was deeply Ramachandra Guha rulers can be relied upon to resented by the proponents of Hindu 100 Years of Mooknayak, convert Mahatma Gandhi’s 150th assertiveness. And these proponents Ambedkar's First Newspaper Prabodhan Pol anniversary into an event on a found it infuriatingly unacceptable Statement Before the US House of staggering scale; but it is important that the Mahatma should invoke his Representatives, Washington D.C. not to be taken in by this grand lip- moral authority to want to call a halt Sandeep Pandey service. to the butchery at work right in the The Ghosts of Auschwitz: Inside Rather, it is imperative for every capital of independent India. Hitler's Killing Machine Priyanjali Malik Indian to remember that the greatest On 12 January 1948, a day Smokescreen of Numbers Indian of the 20th century was before he started his last fast to Jayati Ghosh killed in cold blood when he was bring sanity and peace, a very No Roadmap in Budget to Increase on his way to his customary evening sad Mahatma had observed at the Farmers' Income prayers, and that this saint’s murder evening prayer congregation: Kabir Agarwal was not the handiwork of an isolated “I see the Muslims of Delhi A Brutal Attack on Justice and Civil mad man but part of a collective being killed before my very Liberties in Imran Khan’s Pakistan Ayesha Khan enterprise of cold-hearted, brutal eyes. This is done while my own France: Striking Workers Continue the and evil men. Vallabhbhai is the Home Minister Fight Against Neoliberalism Above all, it is necessary to ask of the Government of India and is Alan MacLeod the question: what kind of ideology responsible for maintaining law and Editor : G. G. Parikh of hate had driven the masterminds order in the Capital. Vallabhbhai has behind the assassination? It is not only failed to give protection Associate Editor : Neeraj Jain important this January 30 for us to to the Muslims, he light-heartedly Managing Editor : Guddi try to find an answer to this question, dismisses any complaint made on because the ideological heirs of this count. I have no option but to Editorial Board : those who had planned Gandhi’s use my last weapon, namely to fast B. Vivekanandan, Qurban Ali, murder have managed to capture until the situation changes.” Anil Nauriya, Sonal Shah, the commanding heights of Indian That fast and its moral rebuke Amarendra Dhaneshwar, politics. were deeply provocative to the Sandeep Pandey Of course, the immediate Hindu rashtra fringe. Something D-15, Ganesh Prasad, provocation for killing the Mahatma had to be done about this “turbulent Naushir Bharucha Marg, was his principled unwillingness priest”, preaching tolerance and to give in to a hatred of Muslims forbearance. And, so a ‘hit’ was Mumbai - 400 007. in the wake of the post-Partition ordered. A crime was committed in Email : [email protected] turmoil. His refusal to concede to the name of the Hindu community, Website:www.janataweekly.org “the Hindus” a right to “settle score” though there has never been an 2 JANATA, February 9, 2020 answer to the question posed by Indeed a strange fascination with himself unapologetically as a partisan Rajendra Prasad: “May I ask how violence has seeped into our in the violent clashes unleashed Gandhiji’s assassination has saved collective functioning. On social in India in the name of this or that Hindu religion or Hindu society?” media platforms, in television studios Hindu cause or sentiment. The More than his principled and newspaper columns, the use of juggalbandi across the seven seas is rejection of the Hindu Raj and intimidation and violence is sought being touted as the finest expression even more than his single-minded to be rationalised as the inevitable of “new India”. In this “new India”, pursuit of a Hindu–Muslim rapport, manifestation of social churning. violence and aggression on the part it was the Mahatma’s propagation of The gau rakshak crowd’s aggression, of the majority community is seen ahimsa (non-violence) as a political roughness and murderous impulses as a prerequisite for new energy and instrument that invited the righteous are explained away as the much- new vitality. wrath of the Mahasabhites/RSS. needed expression of anger and So in this year of Gandhi’s 150th For Gandhi’s opponents, violence animosities of a long-suppressed anniversary, we will stage elaborate was not only inevitable but also “Hindu Samaj”. ceremonies, spectacles and events, necessary if “Hindu society” was to An aggressive nationalism has but there will be no slackening in rediscover its glorious past. been chiselled out of contrived the war against the Mahatma and his It was a time, remember, when resentments and deprivations. message. After all, his murder cannot Europe was passionately enamoured Almost all sections of society have be allowed to go in vain. of fascism and its eager embrace of fallen for a meretricious nationalism, violence as the currency of political as violence has always lingered (Harish Khare is a journalist who mobilisation. In the context of the on just beneath the surface. It was lives and works in Delhi. He was, violent 20th century, Gandhi’s Gandhi’s eternal accomplishment until recently, editor-in-chief of The greatest service to India was to wean that he succeeded in rolling back Tribune.) us away from this fascist allure of this engagement with violence by violence and coercion. On the other inviting Indians to experience the hand, the Hindu rashtra ideologues, noble and spiritual joys of ahmisa. Janata as has been argued, were inspired And it is this Gandhian accent and emboldened by the rampant on ahmisa that the Sangh parivar is available at success the fascists had achieved in finds most galling. Instead, violence Germany and Italy. is applauded as a necessary and www.lohiatoday.com It is this infatuation with unavoidable antidote to the violence that refuses to fade away, traditional “Hindu cowardice”. Janata Subscription despite more than six decades of a The long centuries of domination constitutional order in independent of “outsiders” have been put down Annual Rs. : 260/- India. The argument has been to our inadequate mastery over joined vigorously. The Nehruvian instruments of violence. Three Years : 750/- consensus is to be dismantled The NRI has perhaps become Demand Draft / precisely because its preferred mode the most dangerous, if only a long- Cheque on of political exchange is argument and distance, partner in this infatuation persuasion. Today we have a ruling with violence in India. From the Mumbai Bank clique that is in thrall of violence safety of their North American in favour of and its presumed curative influence perch, the NRIs are only too happy in the society. New enemies are to applaud and finance the politics JANATA TRUST being invented and these have to of resentment back in India; indeed, be dealt with sternly, violently and they are working out their own D-15, Ganesh Prasad, coercively. prejudices and anxieties in an Naushir Bharucha Marg, Today, majoritarian politics is increasingly uncertain global order. Grant Road (W), being pushed ahead by a preference In this age of angry nationalism, Mumbai 400 007. for violence in words and deeds. the NRI is all too willing to position JANATA, February 9, 2020 3 The Time Has Come to Bring Ambedkar and Gandhi Together Ramachandra Guha In an interview that he gave Ambedkar and Gandhi being Feet, the late D.R. Nagaraj urged last year, the Kannada writer (and displayed together at student us to see the work of Ambedkar and activist), Devanur Mahadeva, urged protests in Delhi. This was rare, Gandhi as complementary. The work democrats not to view Ambedkar if not unprecedented. For it is of undermining the caste system and and Gandhi as rivals and adversaries. much more common to see Gandhi of delegitimising untouchability In the journey towards true equality, and Ambedkar being celebrated required both pressure from Dalits he said, they should rather be seen as separately. Indeed quite often they themselves — which Ambedkar colleagues and co-workers. Thus, as are placed in opposition to one provided — and from upper-caste Mahadeva remarked: another. reformers — which is what Gandhi “Ambedkar had to awaken In the past, it was usually represented. Nagaraj was a friend the sleeping Dalits and then make admirers of Gandhi who saw these of Devanur Mahadeva’s, and the the journey. Gandhi had to make two great Indians in adversarial two must surely have exercised a the immense effort of uplifting, terms. In the 1930s and 1940s, reciprocal influence on one another. correcting, changing those who were Ambedkar had often used polemical Whether or not they know of drowned in Hindu caste religion, in language to attack Gandhi and his their work, the students of Jamia caste wells, to take a step forward. ideas. This outraged Congressmen, and the women of Shaheen Bagh When you see all this, maybe Gandhi who could not countenance any substantiate the large-hearted would not have traversed far without criticism of their beloved Bapu. analysis of Nagaraj and Devanur the presence of Ambedkar. Similarly, They responded by characterising Mahadeva. Like those two thinkers I feel that without the liberal tolerant Ambedkar as an apologist for British of Karnataka, these brave protesters atmosphere created by Gandhi in the rule, damned him for serving on the of Delhi admirably urge us not to wells of Hindu caste religion, then Viceroy’s Executive Council during posit Ambedkar and Gandhi as this cruel Savarna society may not the Quit India movement of 1942 rivals.

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