Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar was an Indian jurist, economist, social reformer and political leader who headed the committee drafting the Constitution of India from the Constituent Assembly debates, served as Law and Justice minister in the first cabinet of Jawaharlal Nehru, and inspired the Dalit Buddhist movement after renouncing Hinduism.
The Dalit Buddhist movement is a religious as well as a socio-political movement among Dalits in India which was started by B. R. Ambedkar. It re-interpreted Buddhism and created a new school of Buddhism called Navayana. The movement has sought to be a socially and politically engaged form of Buddhism.
Dalit is a term first coined by the Indian social reformer Jyotirao Phule for untouchables and outcasts, who represented the lowest stratum of the castes in the Indian subcontinent. Dalits were excluded from the fourfold varna of the caste hierarchy and were seen as forming a fifth varna, also known by the name of Panchama. Several scholars have drawn parallels between Dalits and the Burakumin of Japan, the Baekjeong of Korea and the peasant class of the medieval European feudal system.
Mahar is one of the dominant caste found in Maharashtra. They were considered as untouchables or low caste. Majority of this community is found in Vidharbha region and neighbouring areas.
Chokhamela was a Hindu saint in Maharashtra, India in the 14th century. He belonged to the Mahar caste,, which was considered that time one of the low castes in India. He was born at Mehuna Raja, a village in Deulgaon Raja Taluka of Buldhana district. He lived at Mangalvedha in Maharashtra. He wrote many Abhangas. One of his known Abhangas is 'Abir Gulal Udhlit Rang". Social activist Arvind Prabhakar Kayande Started Celebrating "Chokhamela Festival" in Deulgaon Raja. He was one of the first low-cast poets in India.
Nandanar, also known as Thirunaallaippovaar and Tirunallaipovar Nayanar, was a Nayanar saint, who is venerated in the Hindu sect of Shaivism. He is the only Dalit saint in the Nayanars. He is generally counted as the eighteenth in the list of 63 Nayanars. Like the other Nayanars, he was a devout devotee of the god Shiva.
Navayāna, otherwise known as Navayāna Buddhism, refers to the modern re-interpretation of Buddhism founded and developed by the Indian jurist, social reformer, and scholar B. R. Ambedkar; it is otherwise called Neo-Buddhism and Ambedkarite Buddhism.
Sukhadeo Thorat an Indian economist, educationist, professor and writer. He is the former chairman of the University Grants Commission. He is professor emeritus in Centre for the Study of Regional Development, Jawaharlal Nehru University. He is an expert on B. R. Ambedkar.
The Battle of Koregaon was fought on 1 January 1818 between the British East India Company and the Peshwa faction of the Maratha Confederacy, at Koregaon Bhima.
Majya Jalmachi Chittarkatha is an autobiography of Shantabai Kamble published in 1983. This is considered the first autobiographical narrative by a Dalit woman writer. The work has been translated into various languages and is required reading for Marathi literary students at the University of Mumbai.
Dalit literature is a genre of Indian writing that focuses on the lives, experiences, and struggles of the Dalit community, who have faced caste-based oppression and discrimination for centuries. This literature encompasses various Indian languages such as Marathi, Bangla, Hindi, Kannada, Punjabi, Sindhi, Odia and Tamil and includes diverse narratives like poems, short stories, and autobiographies. The movement originated in response to the caste-based social injustices in mid-twentieth-century independent India and has since spread across various Indian languages, critiquing caste practices and experimenting with different literary forms.
Hardas Laxmanrao Nagrale, popularly known as Babu Hardas, was an Indian Dalit leader, politician and social reformer. He was an ardent follower of B. R. Ambedkar and was pioneer of the practice of exchanging the greeting Jai Bhim amongst the Dalits. He was also a prominent labour leader in the Central Province and was the general secretary of the Independent Labour Party in the province. Hardas was also the first Member of the Legislative Assembly to be elected from Nagpur Kamptee constituency in 1937.
Mahad Satyagraha or Chavdar Tale Satyagraha was a satyagraha led by B. R. Ambedkar on 20 March 1927 to allow untouchables to use water in a public tank in Mahad, Maharashtra, India. The day is observed as Social Empowerment day in India.
S. Anand is an Indian author, publisher and journalist. He, along with D. Ravikumar, founded the publishing house Navayana in 2003, which is "India’s first and only publishing house to focus on the issue of caste from an anticaste perspective." Navayana won the British Council-London Book Fair International Young Publisher of the Year award in 2007. In Pali, the word "navayana" means "new vehicle". B. R. Ambedkar used the word in 1956 to describe the branch of Buddhism that wouldn't be mired in the Hinayana-Mahayana divide, but would help dalits gain equality in India.
Jangarh Singh Shyam (1962–2001) was a pioneering contemporary Indian artist credited with being the creator of a new school of Indian art called Jangarh Kalam. His work has been exhibited widely the world over including Bhopal, Delhi, Tokyo and New York. His most notable exhibitions include the Magiciens de la terre in Paris (1989) and Other Masters curated by Jyotindra Jain at the Crafts Museum, New Delhi (1998). His 1988 piece Landscape with Spider sold for $31,250 at Sotheby's, New York, in 2010—a first for an adivasi artist. Jangarh had also painted the interiors of the Legislative Assembly of Madhya Pradesh, the Vidhan Bhavan, and the dome of Bhopal's Bharat Bhavan—one of the most prestigious museums of tribal and contemporary Indian art. He was among the first Gond artists to use paper and canvas for his paintings, thereby inaugurating what is now known as Jangarh Kalam.
Venkat Raman Singh Shyam is a contemporary Indian artist who works with murals, etchings, mixed media and animation. Venkat has travelled extensively and exhibited his work in India and the world over. He was awarded the Rajya Hasta Shilpa Puraskar by the Government of Madhya Pradesh in 2002. He was also the coordinator for an animated film on a Gond folktale made by Tara Douglas which won the Tallest Story Competition Trophy at the Inverness Film Festival, Scotland, in 2007.
Baby Kamble, commonly known as Babytai Kamble, was an Indian activist and writer. She was born into an untouchable caste, Mahar, the largest untouchable community in Maharashtra. She was a well-known Dalit activist and writer who was inspired by B. R. Ambedkar, prominent dalit leader. Kamble and her family converted to Buddhism and remained lifelong practicing Buddhists. In her community, she came to be admired as a writer and was fondly called as Tai. She is widely remembered and loved by the Dalit community for her contributions of powerful literary and activist work. She is one of the earliest women writers from the untouchable communities whose distinctive reflexive style of feminist writing setting her apart from other Dalit writers and upper caste women writers who gaze was limited and reflexivity incarcerated in caste and masculinity.
Durga Bai Vyam is an Indian artist. She lives in Bhopal and works in the Gond tradition of tribal art.
Mooknayak was a Marathi fortnightly-Newspaper founded by B. R. Ambedkar in 1920. The newspaper aimed to reveal the pain and rebellion of society. The first issue of Mooknayak was published on 31 January 1920. This paper was published from Mumbai. An educated youth of Mahar caste named Pandurang Nandram Bhatkar edited this Newspaper. Because Ambedkar was working as a professor in Sydenham College. Therefore, he could not work as an editor openly. So he appointed Gyandev Dhruvanath Gholap as the manager of Mooknayak. Ambedkar himself wrote the foreword in the first issue titled 'Manogat'. He also wrote articles in the next thirteen issues. Chhatrapati Rajarshi Shahu of Kolhapur had given financial assistance of Rs 2,500 for Mooknayak. Ambedkar published Mooknayak in the Marathi language, Because Marathi language was the common language or folk language of that time and B. R. Ambedkar's area of work was Maharashtra. Also at that time the Dalit people of Maharashtra were not very educated, they could only understand Marathi.
