Ambedkar, Gandhi's goal was same: Guha

Noted historian and thinker Ramachandra Guha opined that though Gandhi and Amedkar had ideological differences, it is possible to find some sort of uniformity between the two as the final goal of the two was upliftment of dalits.

Delivering a lecture on ‘Gandhi’s interaction with generations’ organised by Ninansam in its annual culture camp at Heggodu near here on Monday, he said thought Gandhi and Ambedkar had disagreements over the methods of upliftment of Dalits, there was no difference between the two in terms of the goal.

According to Gandhi, practicing untouchability is a sin and people belonging to upper castes must clean their minds and strive for the eradication of such social evil. But Ambedkar had believed that dalits, who faced insult and embarrassment by upper castes people, had to annihilate social discrimination by themselves. So, it is not necessary to separate Gandhi and Ambedkar as far as the issue related upliftment of dalits is concerned, he viewed.   

Referring to Gandhi’s link with Veer Savarkar, strong believer in Hindutva, Mr Guha said Gandhi had interacted with Savarkar also. Savarkar wanted to make India as the country of Hindus and people belonging to other religions to be treated as second class citizens. But Gandhi had aspired to build India on the basis of multi-religious and multi-cultural society.

So, it is not possible to find uniformity between the two under any circumstance. Noted writer D S Nagabhushana, theater director K V Akshara and others participated in the  interaction.

Later, Artistes of Ninasam enacted drama titled ‘Su bitrebanna, ba bitresunna’ under the direction of Iqbal Ahmed.