Synopses & Reviews
Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar was born in 1891 into an “Untouchable” family of modest means. One of India’s most radical thinkers, he transformed the social and political landscape in the struggle against British colonialism. He was a prolific writer who oversaw the drafting of the Indian Constitution and served as India’s first Law Minister. In 1935, he publicly declared that though he was born a Hindu, he would not die as one. Ambedkar eventually embraced Buddhism, a few months before his death in 1956.
Arundhati Roy is the author of the Booker Prize–winning novel The God of Small Things. Her recent political writings include Listening to Grasshoppers, Broken Republic, and Capitalism: A Ghost Story.
S. Anand is the publisher of Navayana, an independent press in New Delhi. He is the coauthor of Ambedkar: The Fight for Justice, a graphic biography, and has annotated this edition of Annihilation of Caste.
Synopsis
“Reading Ambedkar bridged the gap between what most Indians are schooled to believe and the reality we experience every day of our lives.” —Arundhati Roy
The Annihilation of Caste is one of the most important—and still most controversial—works of Indian political writing. Completed in 1936, the book is an audacious denunciation of Hinduism and the caste system that infuriated Gandhi yet has remained a rallying cry for 60 years. In her lengthy introduction Roy looks at how caste has continued through modern Indian history, and why the words of Ambedkar are necessary today more than ever. In startling and urgent writing she shows that caste is the most urgent question if India is to become a world-leading nation.
About the Author
Dr. B R Ambedkar was the first Minister of Law after the Independence of India in 1947 and was the Chairman of the drafting committee for the Constitution of India. He fought valiantly for Freedom, Equality and abolition of Untouchability. He was honored in 1990 with the highest national honor of "Bharata Ratna" (The Jewel of India) by the Indian Government.
Arundhati Roy was born in 1959 in Shillong, India. She studied architecture in New Delhi, where she now lives. She has worked as a film designer and screenplay writer in India. Roy is the author of the novel The God of Small Things, for which she received the 1997 Booker Prize. The novel has been translated into dozens of languages worldwide. She has written several non-fiction books, including The Cost of Living, Power Politics, War Talk, An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire, and Public Power in the Age of Empire. Roy is the recipient of the 2002 Lannan Foundation Cultural Freedom Prize.
Table of Contents
Editor’s Note by S. Anand
The Doctor and the Saint
by Arundhati Roy
Notes
Bibliography
Annihilation of Caste
by B.R. Ambedkar
1. Preface to Second Edition, 1937
2. Preface to Third Edition, 1944
3. Prologue
4. Annihilation of Caste: An Undelivered Speech, 1936
The Ambedkar–Gandhi debate
5. A Vindication of Caste, by Mahatma Gandhi
6. Sant Ram responds to Gandhi
7. A Reply to the Mahatma, by B.R. Ambedkar
A Note on the Poona Pact
by S. Anand
Bibliography
Acknowledgements
Index