Ambedkar: An Overview

by B.R. Ambedkar

Some might think that the Mahatma has made much progress, inasmuch as he now only believes in varna and does not believe in caste. It is true that there was a time when the Mahatma was a full-blooded and a blue-blooded sanatani Hindu.116 He believed in the Vedas, the Upanishads, the puranas, and all that goes by the name of Hindu scriptures; and therefore, in avatars and rebirth. He believed in caste and defended it with the vigour of the orthodox.117 He condemned the cry for inter-dining, inter-drinking, and intermarrying, and argued that restraints about inter-dining to a great extent ‘helped the cultivation of will-power and the conservation of a certain social virtue.’118 It is good that he has repudiated this sanctimonious nonsense and admitted that caste ‘is harmful both to spiritual and national growth’, and maybe his son’s marriage outside his caste has had something to do with this change of view. But has the Mahatma really progressed? What is the nature of the varna for which the Mahatma stands? Is it the Vedic conception as commonly understood and preached by Swami Dayanand Saraswati and his followers, the Arya Samajists? The essence of the Vedic conception of varna is the pursuit of a calling which is appropriate to one’s natural aptitude. The essence of the Mahatma’s conception of varna is the pursuit of one’s ancestral calling, irrespective of natural aptitude.

Critique Of gandhi 3