Vanchit Bahujan Aaghadi (VBA) President Prakash Ambedkar.
Credit: PTI Photo
Mumbai: Continuing his attack on the ruling BJP-led NDA and the Congress-headed I.N.D.I.A. opposition bloc, veteran politician and Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi founder Prakash Ambedkar asserted that Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), Other Backward Classes (OBCs) are gaining political power.
Lawyer-activist-politician Ambedkar (70), the grandson of Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, the chief architect of the Constitution of India, is a two-time MP from Akola from Maharashtra and an ex-Rajya Sabha MP.
The VBA, which included various groups of Dalits, Tribals, Dhangars, Kolis, Agris, Banjaras, Malis, Kaikadis and other communities including Muslims, have over the past few years have emerged as a major political force, though it has not yet won seats in the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha polls.
“They are afraid of the Vanchits and Bahujans - SCs, STs and OBCs - gaining political power,” Ambedkar said in a message to VBA party workers.
“Those who claim that our party has no political strength left, see VBA as a major political rival. And, they know that we carry the ideology and strong mass base. And, this is the real reason for the fear of these fake Phule-Shahu-Ambedkarites. They know that if the VBA, the real Phule-Shahu-Ambedkarite political party, comes to power, their fake showrooms will be forever locked,” said Ambedkar.
According to him, the VBA getting political power - this is nothing short of a horrible nightmare for the fake Phule-Shahu-Ambedkarites. “That is why they work 24x7 to defame the vanquished. They do not want the voice of the Vanchits to reach the corridors of power. To defame us, they are spending their looted black money, using their pocket media and influencers day and night, 24x7 to defame us. Our independent, fearless politics for the rightful share of SCs, STs and OBCs has put their politics in trouble,” said Ambedkar.
He said that after his state-wide Aarakshan Bachao Yatra, riots and potential violence stopped in Maharashtra and further increased VBA’s acceptance. "OBCs, SCs and STs joined us and this is what scares them,” he said.
On being called BJP's B-team, Ambedkar said: “This is not new to us. They did the same to Babasaheb Ambedkar. The Congress never wanted an independent Ambedkarite leader to emerge and realise Babasaheb's dream. Babasaheb was defeated by the Congress twice - in the 1952 parliamentary election from Bombay North and in the 1954 by-election from Bhandara. He was called a divider of society and a traitor. The toxic campaign against Babasaheb was so venomous and vile that his health deteriorated and he died two years later in 1956.”
“When Babasaheb went to London as a representative of the Dalit class at the first Round Table Conference, the Congress and its newspapers called him a stooge of the British. Only when the Congress could not find a capable person to frame the Constitution, they turned to Babasaheb. Congress only wants Dalits as their chamchas whom they can put them on a leash and control."
Ambedkar further said that when Congress' own Jagjivan Ram was on the political path to become India's first Dalit Prime Minister, the ‘savarnas’ in Congress could not digest this. “When they could not find any wrongdoing in Jagjivan Ram's political career, they went after his son and leaked his private pictures, which ended Jagjivan Ram's political career and his chances of becoming India's first Dalit Prime Minister.
I say again, counter their lies with the truth.”
Ambedkar also questioned why then NCP President Sharad Pawar gave unconditional support to BJP in 2014 in Maharashtra. “Ask them on whose instructions did Ajit Pawar form a government with BJP overnight in 2019,” he said.
He also hit out at the BJP-led alliance for not being able to sort out the reservation issue.