Fake gau rakshaks must be dealt with: Ramdas Athawale

The Republican Party of India(A) was a key ally of the Congress-NCP for 18 years but in 2013, party chief Ramdas Athawale decided to throw in his lot with the BJP-led NDA. The switchover helped him become a Rajya Sabha member and later Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Special Assistance. Known as one of the most accessible and vocal ministers of the Modi Cabinet, Athawale spoke to Kanchan Srivastava on a range of issues. Excerpts:

What are the three biggest achievements of the Modi government in the past three years? 

Handing over of Indu Mills land in Mumbai, worth Rs 3,600 crore, for the grand memorial of Babasaheb Ambedkar is the biggest achievement of our government so far. The Rs 500-crore memorial will have a 350-foot tall statue of Ambedkar, which will be taller than the Statue of Liberty (in the US). The grand celebration of the 125th birth anniversary of Dr Ambedkar, with several welfare schemes, and declaring November 26 (Ambedkar’s birth anniversary) as ‘Constitution Day’ are two other big achievements. Our government and the ministry has taken several measures such as the BHIM app to promote e-transaction, a Rs 125 coin and a stamp in Dr Ambedkar’s name, raising the income limit for quota benefits, and quota in promotion, among others.

Some sceptics, like Ram Bahadur Rai (the chairman of Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts), have claimed that Dr Ambedkar had not written the Constitution, but had just corrected the language. How do you react to this allegation?

 Dr Ambedkar had not written the Constitution alone. He was the Chairman of the Drafting Committee. All members of the committee must be given due credit. However, Dr Ambedkar’s contribution was the biggest among them all. Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Dr Rajendra Prasad, to whom Dr Ambedkar submitted the draft of the Constitution, had both told him, “You are the architect of the Constitution.”

Do you think projecting Dr Ambedkar as a Dalit icon was an erroneous approach?

Yes. Baba Saheb was a common man’s leader. As the chief architect of the Indian Constitution, he worked for all Indians. Although he faced extreme caste-based discrimination in his childhood, he never opposed Brahmins or Hindus but opposed Brahminism and the ill-practices of Hinduism. The Modi government is doing everything to recast Dr Ambedkar as a leader of the masses. Even the decision of demonetisation was inspired by Dr Ambedkar, who had proposed a change of currencies every 10 years in his research paper, ‘Problem of Rupee’, written during his London School of Economics days. His economic policy and views on legal, administrative, agricultural and other systems were far ahead of his time. He is the most popular Indian leader in the world. Modiji has admitted that had Ambedkar not drafted the Constitution, a chaiwala (tea seller) would not have become the PM. All these things validate Baba Saheb’s mass appeal.

Do you think the demand for a beef ban across India is justified?

I support the cow slaughter ban but am against the ban on the slaughter of cow progeny. Maharashtra has implemented it and it has led to loss of jobs for over 25 lakh people in the state. Farmers are affected as they are unable to feed old bullocks. Goa has banned the slaughter of cows, but not their progeny. This is the correct approach, according to me.

Cow vigilantism has led to a spurt in cases of violence against the Dalit and minority communities. People feel that the BJP-led Central government has failed to take a stand against the so-called gau-rakshaks…

See, our society is changing fast. Now, scheduled-caste people are sitting and eating with upper-caste communities. Inter-caste marriages are taking place. However, a lot of people are still against this social engineering. Many villages in the country pursue casteism in the same way as they have been doing since before independence. A lot needs to be done to change the mindset of such people, who harass vulnerable communities on the pretext of some reason or the other. Such fake gau-sevaks and goons who kill humans in the name of cows must be dealt with strictly by the administration.