Imagining a Boundless Religion:

Exploring What Binds To Religion and What Religion Binds To In The Neo-Buddhist Movement in India

By Erin A. Fitzsimmons Adviser: Arthur McKeown

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Introduction: Caste and Buddhism in India

The caste system has been and continues to be an extremely complex and deeply

entrenched mental attitude and social order in India. It is far reaching and intimately entwined in

the many facets of human relations and all spheres of society in India. Johannes Beltz writes in

his book Mahar, Dalit and Buddhist: Religious Conversion and Socio-Political Emancipation,

“The terms caste and class partially overlap and are intertwined, untouchability being a complex

phenomenon with a number of social, economic and religious ramifications.”1 To fully and

honestly understand the intricacies and complexities of this complicated system of graded

inequality consisting of many levels, one would have to spend far more than a month studying

and interviewing those whose lives have been impacted in India. In fact, I feel fairly secure in

saying that one could spend their whole adult life studying such a topic and never know it in full

or discover and understand the entire web of its roots. And therein lays the difficulty of

eradicating it.

Dr. B. R. Ambedkar was the leader of a movement of oppressed caste conversions to

Buddhism as an attempt to liberate themselves from the exploitation and oppression of the Hindu

religion and caste system. He pushed his followers to join the movement using the catchphrase,

“educate, agitate, organize!” and led a mass conversion at Dikshabhoomi in Nagpur on Oct. 14,

1956, shortly before the end of his life. Buddhism became a means to combat injustice and

inequality. It was a religion born to India, with Indian roots, that had exported itself to thrive in

other countries as it slowly died in its own motherland. Ambedkar sought to revive both the

religion and the people of India by reinterpreting Buddhism as a humanistic, rational religion.

“He adapted this formula to affirm the Indian origins of his philosophy. Irrespective whether the

1 Beltz, Johannes. Mahar, Buddhist and Dalit: Religious Conversion and Socio-Political Emancipation. New Delhi: Manohar, 2005. 33.

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as a conscious choice or not, Ambedkar can present Buddhism as an Indian social philosophy

that aims at establishing justice for all mankind…Justice means social equality.”2

For the purpose of this study, I tried to connect with those working within the current

movement of caste annihilation in the wake of Ambedkar’s conversion on October 14th, 1956 and

death on December 6th 1956 through the TBMSG (Trailokya Bauddha Mahasangha Sahayak

Gana) organization, mainly because of the connections I already had there. Because of limited

time in conducting this study, I thought it best to go where I felt certain I would be able to get

interviews. And TMBSG is that place. Also, as Nitin, a financial advisor and Dalit activist

working in Manuski Center’s back office in Pune explained, “TMBSG is at the epicenter of the

spiritual movement,”3 and therefore guaranteed the necessary presence of the Buddhist

component of this study. It must be recognized that the people interviewed here do not represent

the whole movement, but rather one organization’s involvement in a larger sensation of a

multitude of “undercurrents,” as Nitin describes them.4 While each person had their own views

and interpretations, they widely fell in line with that of the mission of the TBMSG organization.

It is also important to recognize that this study is not a fair representation of class, as I

was only able to travel in the cities of Nagpur, Pune and Mumbai5 and therefore only able to

speak to people who live in urban areas. I was, obviously, only able to conduct interviews with

those who spoke English. This seriously limited my informants to those who had received

education and were living and working in an urban environment—largely that meant men. From

what I gathered through both interviews and readings, the situation of those in the cities is very

2 Beltz, 653 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve, Manuski Financial Advisor and Dalit Activist, Pune, India, November 29, 2012.4 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve.5 Beltz, 97. “Only in cities like Mumbai, Nagpur, Pune and Aurangabad, does a small middle class of government employees [Mahars /Buddhists/Dalits] live in fairly comfortable conditions.”

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different from that of those in the villages, though I cannot speak to in what ways those

differences manifest.

Regretfully, this paper will not engage deeply with the glaring issues of gender present in

the movement—the lack of female education, lack of presence in leadership as well as

participation, and the intricacies of inter-marriage as the favored, but perhaps problematic,

solution to caste in India.

The most important thing to remember is that people write whole books on this stuff.

This movement is complicated. There is no way I can thoroughly explain all the must be

understood, nor any way I can say all that needs to be said about this in a paper based on a one

month study. This paper will be inherently flawed and insufficient. This movement, to be done

honestly and justly, deserves a lifetime, and even then, it might be impossible to keep up with.

In this paper, I will explore the progress of the Neo-Buddhist movement in India and how

it interacts and engages with the world in hopes of bringing about social change in terms of

social equality, economic equality and equality in political representation. I will explore the

tensions created by different social movements and the strategies they employ, and why Dr.

Ambedkar felt religion was the most effective means towards an end of equality and happiness

for humankind.

John Dewey: on Freeing Religious from Religion

Religion functions as a powerful underlying factor in human society. It posits a common

view or interpretation of the world through which order, norms and power dynamics are

established. It projects a moral code of conduct around which a social structure can blossom.

Religion, as this permeating, infallible force that fosters the power to structure all realms of

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society and influence all spheres of human life, is a delicate and dangerous thing. Throughout the

history of the world, this power has been corrupted over and over again. Religion has the power

to create dogmatic structures of oppression that are established as sacred authority and therefore

infallible, unquestionable and thus, unchanging, such as the caste system in India—a social

structure that has survived and been reinforced to this day due to religion. In his book, A

Common Faith, John Dewey revolutionizes thinking about religion, stressing a shift from

dogmatic faith that reifies structures and stunts progress, to a dynamic one that is unrestrictive,

questions authority and pushes for movement. This paper will explore the Neo-Buddhist

movement in India as influenced by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, and its effectiveness in making the

shift Dewey describes from dogmatic to dynamic faith and the use of the notion of religious

experience and development as a means towards social progress and change.

John Dewey feels that belief in and reverence of the supernatural stagnates religious

interaction with the world and stunts religious energy by putting bounds on what can be defined

as religious experience. There is too much focus on the dogmatic rules and rituals of religion and

too much energy spent worshipping the other-worldly that potential religious energy is diffused

and lost in this world. “In reality,” he writes, “the only thing that can be said to be proved is the

existence of some complex of conditions that have operated to effect an adjustment in life, an

orientation, that brings with it a sense of security and peace.”6 We orient the way we experience

the world around the system of beliefs we set up for ourselves though our conditioning, in a way

that we think will pin down some stability for us to anchor ourselves to in the fluid, changing

world. “That particular interpretation given to this complex of conditions is not inherent in the

experience itself. It is derived from the culture with which a particular person has been imbued.”7

6 Dewey, John. A Common Faith. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. 1934. 13.7 Dewey, 13.

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The interpretation of the world and the religions we worship to fit and make sense of it are

products not of something other-worldly, but rather pragmatic solutions for gaining “peace” in

our present conditions here and now.

The importance placed on religion, as the word pertains to the supernatural, has been

misplaced. “The actual religious experience,” explains Dewey, is in the “effect produced, the

better adjustment in life and its conditions…the way in which the experience operated, its

function, determines its religious value.”8 This focus on function extends farther, to a focus on

social function and betterment. “The sense of the dignity of human nature is as religious as is the

sense of awe and reverence when it rests upon a sense of human nature as a cooperating part of a

larger whole.”9 John Dewey sought to free the “religious” from the bounds of “religion”,

allowing it to abound in all spheres of life and interact with the world free from prescriptions and

dogmatisms, bringing human passion and energy to all human action, rather than restricting it to

one supernatural realm. “A clear and intense conception of a union of ideal ends with actual

conditions is capable of arousing steady emotion. It may be fed by every experience, no matter

what its material.”10

The use of religion as a soteriological tool validates and perpetuates the issues of the here

and now, this world, this life, by promising salvation and betterment as reward for maintaining

peace and not pushing the status quo. This reifies the structure and institutions of authority and

prevents movement forward by pacifying the people, preventing them from challenging the

existent conditions that allow continuous oppression and exploitation of people. We can see this

represented by caste in India today. Religion puts bounds on human reason and limits our

8 Dewey, 14.9 Dewey, 25.10 Dewey, 51.

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inherent capacity for change. “Dewey’s practical philosophy of social improvement, democratic

skills and institutions and his ‘common faith’ in the power of human leaders and communities to

solve their own problems without divine intervention was deeply inspiring to Ambedkar.”11

Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, a former student of John Dewey’s at Columbia University and the

leader of the contemporary Buddhist movement in India, has taken up the humanistic view of

religion that Dewey stresses, criticizing the superstitious as a tool used by the Hindu faith to

create and reinforce graded inequality. In attempts to liberate the Indian people of the

“Scheduled Castes,” those who have been oppressed by the caste system—also called Dalits or

untouchables—Dr. Ambedkar sought to imbue his country with a humanist outlook that values

the relation of human to human. His mission extends far beyond the social, to economic and

political equality. He turned to Buddhism as a means to combat the powerful social structures of

Hindu religion that were already in place and dictating the minds of the society as well as the

economic and political structures. Buddhism, for Ambedkar, was a tool towards liberation, a

means to question what was unquestionable.

Religion vs. Dhamma: Re-centering on Humanity

Buddhism was a blank slate for Ambedkar. It had all the benefits of being an Indic

religion without any of the baggage, as it hardly existed or was being practiced in the country of

its birth. By choosing Buddhism as his means to combat Hinduism, Ambedkar was appealing to

national identity to gain legitimacy. “When Ambedkar announced that he was going to convert to

Buddhism, critics lay low because Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism were considered a part of

Hinduism. Conversion to a non-Indic religion would have been considered a betrayal to the

11 Queen, Christopher. “Ambedkar’s Dhamma: Source and Method in the Construction of Engaged Buddhism.” Reconstructing the World. Ed. Surendra Jodhale and Johannes Beltz. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2004. 138

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ancestral traditions.”12 Buddhism was a strategic selection that was meaningful for his movement

in many ways. It is a flexible and malleable religion, already supporting various interpretations

and practices, so he could easily imbue his vision into it. But also it was a loophole into the

system—it allowed him to work from within a structure of national pride, to tear other aspects of

it down. He could appeal to national Indian identity and cling to common roots, while also

pushing to revolutionize society.

As Ambedkar saw it, Buddhism was a reaction to suffering caused by the “constant and

perpetual” conflict of class.13 It stressed, “the relations between people, and not between an

individual and God,” breathing life into the concept of religion which, under other ideologies has

become a stagnant tool for explanation, human interaction “he considered as the real meaning

and significance of a true religion. Which he called Dhamma.”14 Dhamma is a tool for social

teaching—for living, for being. “Dhamma is social,” Ambedkar writes, “It is fundamentally and

essentially so. Dhamma is righteousness, which means right relations between [hu]man and

[hu]man in all spheres of life. From this it is evident that one [hu]man if [s]he is alone does not

need Dhamma. But when there are two [humans] living in relation to each other they must find a

place for Dhamma whether they like it or not. Neither can escape it.”15 He establishes an ideal

with which, his movement can begin to interact. With his idea of the Dhamma, “Ambedkar

rejects the idea according to which religion is a personal affair,” he establishes a social contract

“regulating the relations between humans and their private and public lives.”16

12 Beltz, 102.13 Ambedkar, Dr. B. R. The Buddha and His Dhamma. Delhi: Siddhartha Books. 2009. 57-58.14 Yurlova, Eugenia. “Social Equality and Democracy in Ambedkar’s Understanding of Buddhism.” Reconstructing the World. Ed. Surendra Jodhale and Johannes Beltz. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2004. 81.15 Ambedkar, Dr. B.R. The Essential Writings of B.R. Ambedkar. Ed. Valerian Rodrigues. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2002. 59.16 Gokhale, Pradeep P. “Universal Consequentilism: A Note on B. R. Ambedkar’s Reconstruction of Buddhism with Special Reference to Religion, Morality and Spirituality.” Reconstructing the World. Ed. Surendra Jondhale and Johannes Beltz. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2004. 126.

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“According to Ambedkar it is impossible to associate Buddhism with pessimism,”17 as it

is often challenged with as it calls attention to the problems of the world, forcing us to focus on

them, rather than gloss over them by glorifying the supernatural. “The Buddha’s dhamma is an

‘optimistic’ message based on two principles: understanding (prajna) and compassion (karuna).

It is in this context that the notion of ‘suffering’ should be placed. It should be thought of not as

fact but as a challenge to humanity.”18 Buddhism calls attention to this suffering to elicit a

response, not to pacify humanity. Without acknowledging our flaws and without engaging with

society there is no possibility for change. Buddhism calls upon society to change, holding us

responsible for our suffering. Ambedkar’s vision of Buddhism pushes society to eliminate

human suffering in its entirety, “this is possible since it is a phenomenon of the material and

social world.”19 In interpreting this as the function of Buddhism, Ambedkar shifts the focus from

the supernatural to the natural, focusing on the righteousness of conduct in relation to other “and

thereby making earth (not heaven) the kingdom of righteousness,”20 and steering away

transcendental concepts such as salvation of the soul.21

Exclusion, Identity and Dissonance

So, here we reach the question of how this reinterpretation is being lived. How is it being

implemented in the social work for eliminating the caste system in India? Dr. Ambedkar’s vision

17 Beltz, 65.18 Beltz, 65.19 Beltz, 65.20 Yurlova, 82.21 Beltz, 68. “Ambedkar explains that this notion [nibbana] is greatly different from Hindu soteriology as it is not a transcendental concept. Nibbana thus cannot be compared to salvation of the soul, it can be translated as happiness and can be attained in the present life by following the Noble Eightfold Path. It implies control over the emotions and a procedure allowing continuing on the path of justice. In other words, nibbana is the objective of a righteous life. It thus concerns the present life of an individual.”

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was to free his country from the rule of superstition and Hinduism and unite his country under a

morality, as put forth by Buddhism. This sort of militant Buddhist approach is, in some ways,

problematic. It can be alienating for those who have not embraced Buddhism, and end up

excluding other oppressed peoples from the movement, thus causing the movement to work as a

source of oppression itself. Perhaps because of this, some of the informants were hesitant to

mirror Ambedkar’s ideals of a Buddhist nation, creating a bit of a dissonance between Ambedkar

and the current movement.

Mannidhamma, the principle of the newly established Bachelors’ degree program in

Buddhist Studies at Nagaloka Institute in Nagpur clarified, “Not everyone has to be Buddhist—

that’s not what I am saying—everyone just needs to be developing themselves.”22 Similarly,

Vivekiratna, the residential director at Nagaloka Institute, stressed the importance to

“recognizing others on a basis of being a human.” He spoke a lot about breaking down caste

psychology. “Buddhism is not the gain itself—it is the means to transform society. That

transformation of society needs to happen in India…All these communities are coming here and

we are teaching them ‘you are just a human being’—coming to know that point first. You are

just a human being…”23

Others, however, stand by this need for universal, or at least national, Buddhism. Divya, a

female student at Nagaloka from Tamil Nadu, who was kind enough to share some of her time

with me, expressed that before we can see any real change in India there will have to be a focus

to “develop and enlighten India—to make all of India Buddhist.”24 Utpala, another female

22 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, principle of the Bachelors’ degree program in Buddhist Studies and Ambedkar Thought at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India, November 15, 2012.23 Personal Interview with Vivekiratna, residential director at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India, November 18, 2012.24 Personal Interview with Divya Shakya, student in the three year Bachelors’ degree program in Buddhist Studies and Ambedkar Thought at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India, November 19, 2012.

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student at Nagaloka from Utter Pradesh, added that that process would take “a lot of time, energy

and power.”25 Nitin, a Dalit activist affiliated with TMBSG’s Manuski Center in Pune, stressed

the reasons for Ambedkar’s insistence on Buddhism:

Buddhism is the best religion where you can have the best practices—how mind can be refined, how personality can be refined… Babasheb wanted to break down structures through religious conversion. Everyone was pushing them [Dalits] towards impurity. Society forced their beliefs on us, with no way out. Babasheb wanted to give them a mental framework for a better life…he [Ambedkar] said ‘I will make entire India a Buddhist India,’ fraternity needs to extend to all, closed fraternity is dangerous. Open fraternity can only be achieved though culture of mind.26

Nitin felt that to develop “common fraternity” Indians need to develop common Buddhist values

as Buddhism is the “best” means for culturing the mind.27

This idea of “religious exclusivity” that glorifies Buddhism as the only answer for caste

annihilation and unification of the oppressed people of the world, ironically “lead to a certain

separation” in the Dalit movement, alienating certain groups, such as the Dalit Panthers, from

“other progressive movements” and fragmenting the energy causing, perhaps, a tapering off of

the movement.28 Nitin’s sentiments, however, do perfectly reflects Ambedkar’s reasoning as

Beltz describes, Ambedkar defines “religion as the ideal form of organizing a civil society. He

specifies that the function of religion is not to explain the origin of the world, but to reconstruct

the world and to make mankind happy. The ideal religion is one that transforms society into a

moral, ideal, and democratic order, such as Buddhism.”29

Why not atheism? If the main cause of caste oppression is religious authority and

Brahmanism, why not atheism? Buddhism is a religion when it is convenient for it to be—when

25 Personal Interview with Utpala Chakma, student in the three year Bachelors’ degree program in Buddhist Studies and Ambedkar Thought at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India, November 19, 2012.26 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve.27 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve.28 Beltz, 95.29 Beltz, 75.

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it is powerful for it to be, but otherwise it is a “Dhamma,” a “way of life” that “differs

fundamentally from what is called Religion.”30 “Ambedkar distances himself from militant

atheism as he sees it preached and practiced by communist countries,” Beltz writes, “He

definitely sympathizes with the modern, rational and scientific thinking but he considers religion

as one of the bases of social life.”31 By claiming religion as a base for human society and social

development, he reifies the power of religion and in doing such reifies the power of Hindu

structure and religious authority. Despite wanting to break down that structure, Ambedkar is

maintaining the framework and trying to use the delicate and dangerous power of religion

towards achieving his vision. In doing this he begins to play with fire. As Arundhati Roy says,

“When independent, thinking people … begin to rally under flags, when writers, painters,

musicians, film makes suspend their judgment and blindly yoke their art to the service of the

nation, it’s time for all of us to sit up and worry,”32 The same is true for religion, or any dogmatic

structure. Ambedkar was unwilling to give up religion entirely because he recognized its power

and hoped by shifting to Buddhism, some of that power could be retained, and work towards his

ideal.

Again, we can see some dissonance here. For Mannidhamma “Buddhism is neither a

philosophy nor a religion—it’s a way of living. If you say religion… well… there is no God. If

you say philosophy… it goes beyond philosophy. So we say, ‘way of life.’”33 Spirituality in Dalit

Buddhism, he explains “is striving for dignity” and nothing more.34 Buddhism, as Mannidhamma

30 Ambedkar, B.R. The Essential Writings of B. R. Ambedkar. 58.31 Beltz, 7232 Roy, Arundhati. “Come September.” An Ordinary Person’s Guide to Empire. New Delhi and New York: Penguin Group. 2005. 15.33 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, principle of Bachelors’ degree program in Buddhist Studies and Ambedkar Thought at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India, November 19, 2012.34 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma. November 15, 2012.

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sees it, “is and was very progressive,”35 “was never a religion,” and is “in the interest of

humanity.”36 To get rid of caste, Mannidhamma emphasized, “we must ban religious things that

help strengthen caste and greaten the divide,” creating a true separation of religion and state that

India has yet to see. “Technically, the division is there, but in reality, India is still very much a

Hindu state.”37

Professor Pradeep Aglave expressed similar sentiments, “According to the constitution

people should be equal. But caste is not changing. These changes [the constitution] are outer

changes! There is no inner! If Hinduism is destroyed from the land, from the State, there will be

development, if not, then no. Discrimination will still be observable in society.” When asked

what tools can be used to change minds and eliminate Hinduism, Professor Aglave said:

How did we change? We changed our ideology. This is the movement of Buddhism. It is our duty to spread humanity. Dr. Ambedkar embraced Buddhism based on humanity. There should be movement. If we bring changes to society there should be movement. It is not the work of one person but the work of many good persons. They come together and there should be movement. Movement is very important, movement changes society, without movement there is no change.

When asked what does this movement look like, he said that there are many names—humanity,

equality, Ambedkarism—the difference is only nominal, “names are different, so I can say it is a

movement of Ambedkarism, a movement of Buddhism, of humanity, the names are different but

everyone wants to establish values in society. If you are doing work for humanity, I will be with

you.”38 He does not mention religion, for him, it is all about humanity.

Sushant, a lifelong student of meditation, and a teacher of meditation at Manuski, who

has studied meditation traditions in China and Taiwan describes “the interdependence of ethics,

35 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, November 15, 2012.36 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, November 19, 2012.37 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, November 19, 2012.38 Personal Interview with Pradeep Aglave, Professor of Ambedkarite Thought at Nagpur University Post Graduate Program, Nagpur, India, November 19, 2012.

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concentration and wisdom” to be the “basic teachings of the Buddha.” To demonstrate this he

drew a circle on a white board, labeling the top with an “e” then the two bottom curves with a

“c” and a “w.” “You can’t have any without the others,” Sushant explained. “Ethics is the

beginning, ethics is also the ending.” As ethics grow, so will the others, and they will fuel the

growth and development of ethics.39 There is no prescription for how to do this; it is “our

responsibility as humans to bring this to our practice, to our actions.” This, he believes, is the

goal. “Meditation is not the only way, but it is the way, in my experience, that has worked to

eradicate mental poisons,”40 that cloud the mind and fuel caste.

Along with these dissonances created between Ambedkar’s thought and how it has been

understood by his followers—mainly that there is Buddhism is not the only solution, but rather a

means that might work—there is also a dissonance created between John Dewey and his vision

of religion in the interest of man and Ambedkar’s actualization of a humanist religious

revolution. Ambedkar replaces God with morality.41 He replaces the word “religion” with

Dhamma, and he stresses rationality and inquiry, and in the wake of his re-turning of the wheel

of Dharma, his changing of the wheel of Dharma,42 he has established a “new ‘angle’ on truth”43

that eliminates the supernatural, but maintained religion as the basis of society, and has retained

its unquestionable nature. He has become an infallible figure, who, yes, has created a new social

structure and new ideal that formed out of a vision of equality, but his vision has become

institutionalized and authoritative, shutting the same doors he sought to open in a new, different

39 Personal Interview with Sushant. Meditation Teacher at Manuski Center, Pune, India, November 23, 2012.40 Personal Interview with Sushant.41 Ambedkar, Dr. B. R. The Buddha and his Dhamma. 224 “Individuals come and go. But the moral order of the universe remains and so also the law of Kamma which sustains it. It is for this reason that in the religion of the Buddha, Morality has been given the place of God.”42 Queen, Christopher S.”Dr. Ambedkar and the Hermeneutics of Buddhist Liberation.” Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia. Ed. Christopher S. Queen and Sallie B. King. Albany: State University of New York Press. 1996. 62.43 Queen, Christopher S.”Dr. Ambedkar and the Hermeneutics of Buddhist Liberation.” Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia. 62.

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way. Gokhale writes, “Morality, in his scheme, does not depend upon external considerations,

and hence becomes autonomous.”44 This is exactly what John Dewey wanted to avoid. As soon

as we posit morality to be something outside of us, outside of our participation in the world, we

are stripped of our agency. “The process of creation is experimental and continuous,” writes

Dewey:

The artist, scientific man, or good citizen, depends on what others have done before him and are doing around him. The sense of new values that become ends to be realized arises first in dim and uncertain form. As the values are dwelt upon and carried forward in action they grow in definiteness and coherence. Interaction between aim and existent conditions improves and tests the ideal; and conditions are at the same time modified. Ideals change as they are applied in existent conditions. The process endures and advances with the life of humanity.45

Here Ambedkar falls short. He himself—in seeking to humanize religion, to give humanity back

the power—strips humankind of their agency and reifies religion and his vision as something

infallible, only under a different vague name; that of morality.

This reification of religious power is also empowered by a clinging to caste identity.

Segmentation of the movement has been a problem because of divisions among untouchable

castes, which is divided into many layers of graded inequality, resulting in many caste

communities and sub caste communities. Relations between untouchable castes were always

strained, as the system that assigned them their identity is based on inferiority and superiority. It

is no surprise that the “relations were always marked by feelings of competitiveness, domination

and subordination.”46 The Mahars, the Dalit community of Maharashtra to which Ambedkar

belonged, claimed the Buddhist movement as their own, and Ambedkar as their leader, excluding

other Dalit communities. “This indicates a conflict of universal/egalitarian ideals and caste

44 Gokhale, 126.45 Dewey, 49-5046 Beltz, 101.

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identities. It is this complex and apparently contradictory idea that best characterizes the relations

between different untouchable castes in India.”47

These strained and competitive attitudes permeate social life and hinder the progression

of the movement for relating to one another on a human to human basis. It also explains why

inter-caste marriage, which is often offered as the solution to caste in India, is still very rare.

Commitment to caste, and sub-caste, still runs deep and people still tend to stay inside their own

bubble. Nagaloka Institute recently started “Golden Light Foundation,” which, among other

things, rents the Nagaloka Campus as a venue for Buddhist functions such as weddings. “It is

very rare to see inter-caste marriages [at Nagaloka]” Mannidhamma told me, “The caste system

is very deeply rooted, so people still only want to marry within their caste… You even see this

amongst Buddhists because they are new Buddhists and caste is still very much instilled in their

mind.”48 After an interview with Meenakshi Moon where she describes her marriage, Beltz

writes:

It is interesting to note that Meenakshi Moon calls her marriage an inter-caste one, though actually it was a marriage between two different subcastes. This shows the importance of subdivisions in the Mahar community in the earlier days. It also shows that these marriage restrictions have now disappeared. However, the interview proves the absence of subcastes does not necessarily signify that marriages are exogamous. Moon says that Buddhism is egalitarian in its approach and opposed to the caste system, yet insists that her children only marry Buddhists.49

This demonstrates that improvements have been made; the existent conditions are changing, but

that the ideal still needs to be pushed further and these contradictions of equality and

exclusiveness still need to be expelled. “In the context of daily living,” Beltz writes,

47 Beltz 100.48 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma. November 15, 2012.49 Beltz, 92.

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“matrimonial choices follow their own social reasoning.”50 My interview with Mannidhamma

confirms this.

To achieve change on a larger scale Mannidhamma claims there must be a development

of “fellowship” between Dalits and caste Hindus:

We need to change the mind. Caste is in mind, it is not a thing you can touch. We need education for both Dalits and caste Hindus. Everyone needs to understand basic humanity—both the oppressed and the oppressor. We need cooperative works, businesses and schools, where people can mingle together, work together, eat together. There needs to be more interaction between people.51

Mannidhamma expresses the need to build a secular “communitas,” to borrow a word

from Victor Turner’s anthropological work on pilgrimage. Rather than building a sense of

spiritual bounding around religion,52 it needs to be around humanity. Human interaction, sharing

food and common goals (such as working, or schooling) will create a glue on the basis, not of

common religion or pilgrimage as Turner suggested, but of humanity. Rallying around a shared

identity as oppressed peoples is a valuable tool in trying to help people “educate, agitate,

organize!” and realize their dignity, but eventually must be done away with. It too can result in

dogmatism and exclusion and, while it helps initially to unify a group, if clung too it also isolates

and alienates—keeping the unified group a separate entity rather than integrating into the world

and participating in the existent conditions to actualize equality. Professor Sanjay Palwekar with

the department of English at Nagpur University explained that, “It is a balance. Identity is used

to fight against oppression as a tool, caste is maintained from within to mobilize people, but this

tool needs to change too or no change will come from this mobilization.”53 Professor Shende,

50 Beltz 93.51 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, November 19, 2012.52 Turner, Victor. “The Center Out There: Pilgrim’s Goal.” A History of Religions. Vol. 12. No. 3. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1973.53 Personal Interview with Professor Sanjay Palwekar, Professor of English at Nagpur University, Nagpur, India, November 14, 2012.

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also with the English Department added, “It’s like Steinbeck. We carry many identities. Man as

an individual, man as a group. They arise according to the circumstance. We also have to learn

when to let them go.”54 The structure can be used and manipulated, but it is a careful balance to

not get stuck. It is the same with expressing anger, Professor Palwakar told me, “Accepting

wrong doing does not equal hate. Let’s come together now. Anger is fuelling and maintaining

caste. But that doesn’t mean forget the wrong doing.”55

How can marriage be expected to bear the burden of caste annihilation without pushes for

change in other spheres? How can marriage carry the burden for creating equality, when

marriage also is meant to be based on ideas of equality and love? Why would a Buddhist or Dalit

woman ever marry a Hindu man if the Hindu system sees women as inferior, or “double Dalits”

as Divya called them?56 Pravin, a 28 year old self self-proclaimed “destitute” writer explained to

me that women have been oppressed always because men sense that they are “bold enough” to

go against the structures. “Women have the power to control change,” due to their positions as

mothers. This role gives them the power to imbue their children with the right values. “But years

of oppression by frightened men have caused women to loss this boldness. They need to find it

again. When they are bold enough to marry for love, there will be change.” What can men do?

“All we can do is support women.” This shirking of responsibility seems to be, as Pravin would

say, “Taking only one page out of the book,”57 and fails to address the issues of sharing an

ideology that go along with marrying for love. There is not one aspect that can be pointed to,

54 Personal Interview with Professor Dharamdas Shende, Professor of English at Nagpur University, Nagpur, India, November 14, 2012.55 Personal Interview with Professor Sanjay Palwekar.56 Personal Interview with Divya Shakya.57 Interview with Pravin, a Dalit activist and writer not affiliated with TBMSG, Pune, India, November 22, 2012.

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shifted and changed, that will solve the problem of caste. “It is a very clever system” as

Mannidhamma says, “It keeps itself sustained”58 by permeating and burying itself in all spheres.

Institutionalization and Stagnation of Ambedkar’s Vision

By trying to work within the system Ambedkar is institutionalized is more than one way.

Not only does his loophole of Buddhism end up hanging him like a noose by alienating rather

than uniting, but also politically he is de-radicalized. When he was invited to draft the

constitution of India, the government knew what they were doing, but incorporating him into the

development of the constitution they made themselves infallible along with him.59 Anyone you

talk to who is involved with the Ambedkarite Buddhist Movement will have nothing but high

praise for the constitution that Ambedkar instilled with Buddhist values. As we saw earlier with

Professor Aglave, the constitution promises all for equality, the implementation is just not there.

“We have a beautiful constitution here in India,” Nitin told me, “Every Indian has a value… But

not all is possible through the constitution—we need Dhamma to bring about something more.”60

Pravin, a 28 year-old activist who doesn’t affiliate himself with TMBSG saying,

“TBMSG has taken one page out of the book, they don’t fully represent the movement. They are

all about the spiritual,” but hangs out and eats at Manuski nonetheless, stresses the greatness of

Ambedkar’s political work and involvement with the writing of the constitution, “the only

problem is that the government is not following the constitution…societal values will eventually

consume and control the political. We should be pushing the government to represent the societal

values,”61 and pushing societal values to represent the ideal demonstrated by the constitution.

58 Personal Interview with Mannidhamma, November 19, 2012.59 Personal Communications with Hanna Mahon, Peace and Justice Studies Major at Middlebury College and fellow student on Antioch Education Abroad: Buddhist Studies in Bodh Gaya, Pune, India, November 28, 2012.60 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve.61 Personal Interview with Pravin.

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Pravin’s is by far the most critical assessment of the government demanding a push for

more, but still, he idealizes the writings and works of Dr. Ambedkar. He took us on a personal

tour of the Manuski library to familiarize us with all of Dr. Ambedkar’s volumes of writings. By

involving Ambedkar is such a profound way in the new beginning of India after gaining

independence, Ambedkar was subsumed into the institution, de-radicalized, and his followers, no

longer able to criticize their country because it was the work of their leader, were pacified.62

There is no “perfect movement.” Ambedkar is not infallible. This movement, to achieve

real change and cultivate societal values that are in the interest of humankind, needs to continue

to engage with the world, participating in the newly arising conditions that come from those who

came before, and adjusting the conception of the ideal and engaging with it. Ambedkar throwing

out “the dead wood of the past,”63 is not sufficient, it has to be a continual process. The work is

never done. By giving the name Buddhism to his movement, Ambedkar tread dangerously on the

line of dogmatism and dynamism, and has fallen, it seems on the former. Despite spending much

time and energy in his book, The Buddha and his Dhamma, trying to establish a dynamic

president of inquiry, he became an icon of the movement, falling into the exact role he warned

against. While, according to Ambedkar, “The Buddha had carved no niche for himself in his

religion. The Buddha and his religion were quite separate,”64 temples were still erected for the

Buddha and pujas are still offered to him. Ambedkar tried to revitalize the religion in a way that

minimized those aspects and amplified the others, but instead of minimizing, he merely replaced

them. You now can find lavishly framed pictures of Ambedkar with a halo-like glow around his

bespectacled face. There are statues of him walking forward at Buddhist institutions and schools

62 Personal Communications with Hanna Mahon.63 Ambedkar, B.R. “The Buddha and his Future Religion” in The Maha Bodhi, vol. 58. April-May, 1950. A favourite catchphrase of Ambedkar’s borrowed from Professor John Dewey.64 Ambedkar, The Buddha and His Dhamma. 216.

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that are eerily similar to those of the Buddha. The idealism of Ambedkar’s autonomous65

universal moral order66 that has been left behind is plagued with “the inherent vice of all

intellectual schemes of idealism,” explains Dewey, it has converted “the idealism of action into a

system of beliefs.”67

Despite this, his movement has given rise to new conditions—brought dignity to many

people and inspired a flame for further work. Now it is about generating imagination—refusing

to get caught up in the flaws of Ambedkar’s movement and instead questioning what they were,

why they happened and pushing forward for pragmatism.

Conclusion: The Current “Currents” of the Movement

But is there that space? In a country with a structure that largely enforces Brahmanical

caste oppression and Brahmanical society is there a space for social revolution? So does it a shift

or our thinking about religion (religion to religious or dogmatic to dynamic) have the power to

change? Katherine Boo skeptically about the ability of social change that is not proceeded by

economic and political in her author’s note at the end her non-fiction book about slums in

Mumbai, Behind the Beautiful Forevers:

In my reporting I found that young people felt the loss of life acutely. What appeared to be indifference to other people’s suffering had little to do with reincarnation, and less to do with being born brutish. I believe it had a good deal to do with conditions that had sabotaged their innate capacity for moral action. In places where government priorities and market imperatives create a world so capricious that to help a neighbor is to risk your ability to feed your family, and sometimes even your own liberty, the idea of the mutually supportive poor community is demolished.68

65 Gokhale, 126.66 Ambedkar, The Buddha and His Dhamma. 224.67 Dewey, 24.68 Boo, Katherine. Behind The Beautiful Forevers. New York: Random House. 2012. 254.

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Arundhati Roy expresses similar sentiments in her essay Peace is War, “Today the

project of corporate globalization had increased the distance between those who take the

decisions and those who must suffer them even worse. For the poor, the uneducated, the

displaced and dispossessed, the distance puts justice out of reach.”69

How does this strip the oppressed people of India, of the world, of their agency? How

does asking that romanticize their poverty? Is it possible to disentangle it all and claim that social

underlies everything? Especially when economic and political circumstances impede the social

imagination? John Dewey offers this, “The aims and ideals that move us are generated through

imagination. But they are not made out of imaginary stuff. They are made out of the hard stuff of

the world of physical and social experience.”70 Arundhati Roy argues along Deweyan lines that it

is just about a shift of our attention and energy:

One way to cut loose is to understand that for most people in the world, peace is war—a daily battle against hunger, thirst, and the violation of their dignity. Wars are often the end result of a flawed peace, a putative peace. And its flaws, the systematic flaws in what is normally considered to be ‘peace,’ that we ought to be writing about. We have to—at least some of us have to—become peace correspondents instead of war correspondents. We have to lose our terror of the mundane. We have to use our skills and imagination and out art to re-create the rhythms of the endless crisis of normality, and in doing so, expose the politics and processes that make ordinary things—food, water, shelter, and dignity—such a distant dream to ordinary people.71

The small signs of dissonance I have seen in conversations with people like

Mannidhamma, Vivekiratna, Pravin, and others shows hope for a space, though small, for

imagination. As Gail Omvedt said in response to my distress over current conditions and lack of

movement, “There is always a space. It is just about figuring out how to enlarge it.”72 A good

69 Roy, Arundhati. “Peace is War.” An Ordinary Person’s Guide to Empire. New Delhi and New York: Penguin Group. 2005. 112.70 Dewey, 49.71 Roy, Arundhati. “Peace is War.” 107.72 Personal Interview with Gail Omvedt. Author and Academic focusing on Ambedkar and anti-caste movements, Koregaon, India. November 24, 2012.

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friend and student of the Dhamma, Deepak, explains “It’s multifaceted, you have to come at it

from every angle, you know? But at the same time you need to have a focus. Spirituality is

TBMSG’s focus—educating people about the Dhamma—but the political, the economic, that’s

important too.” These interests aren’t mutually exclusive.73 In an interview with Nitin, he gave a

water metaphor, in true Buddhist style, “There are many different undercurrents of the

movement. Politically, you have the BSP spearheading Dalit issues. They are the mouthpiece for

this section of society, ensuring policies are being checked. And we have TBMSG at the

epicenter of the religious, spiritual movement—encouraging ethical behavior educating families

and cultivating confidence. The movement is still in the process of education. Agitate, organize

are yet to come.” When I asked how these will currents come together, he explained “Currents

don’t require strategies to connect. If they are all going in the same direction, they will

converge.”74 His friend added, “All rivers lead to the same ocean.”75

With each “turning of the wheel” or “changing of the wheel,”76 new existent conditions

are brought about, the ideal must be dependent on these conditions, and must change as they

change, “The sense of new values that become ends to be realized arises first in dim and

uncertain form. As the values are dwelt upon and carried forward in action they grow in

definiteness and coherence. Interaction between aim and existent conditions improves and tests

the ideal; and conditions are at the same time modified. Ideals change as they are applied in

existent conditions. The process endures and advances with the life of humanity,” ensuring a

dynamism and preventing the dangers of dogmatism and the pacifying powers of authority.

73 Personal Interview with Deepak, Dhamma student and Dalit activist involved at Manuski, Pune, India, November 26, 2012.74 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve.75 Personal Interview with Sujit Nandagawali, friend of Nitin, Pune, India, November 29, 2012.76 Queen, Dr. Ambedkar and the Hermeneutics of Buddhist Liberation. 65.

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I don’t believe that Ambedkar’s slogan “educate, agitate, organize,” was meant to be

thought of linearly, as Nitin suggests. These ideas are meant to be more like Sushant’s drawing,

building off and reinforcing each other simultaneously. As Katherine Boo, Arundhati Roy and

the issue of inter-marriage all illustrate, when we aren’t pushing in all directions, there is no

flexibility for change in the realm we point to as the source of the problem, be it social, such as

inter-marriage, economic, like the poverty Boo describes, or political as Roy suggests. Ambedkar

extended Dewey’s ideas of humanism and imagination to his movement, but he didn’t go far

enough. His push was restrictive and remained bounded by the power of “religion,” failing to

link all the spheres of life under Dewey’s idea of “religious.” There needs to be room for

continued dissonance and a changing ideal in order for continued progress. Enlarging the space

for imagination to work in all spheres means creating a space for the life of humanity to grow.

True dynamism has to permeate all spheres. “Currents” from all realms of human life

converging,77 creating tensions and resolutions and new tensions, is the “religious” Dewey is

describing, being fully engaged in living, the interaction of actual existent conditions with the

ideal. As the conditions are impermanent and changing, so is the ideal.

References:

Aglave, Pradeep. Professor of Ambedkarite Thought at Nagpur University Post-Graduate Program, Nagpur, India. Personal Interview. November 19, 2012.

Ambedkar, Dr. B. R. The Buddha and His Dhamma. Delhi: Siddhartha Books. 2009

Ambedkar, Dr. B.R. “The Buddha and his Future Religion” in The Maha Bodhi, vol. 58. April-May, 1950.

77 Personal Interview with Nitin Salve.

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Ambedkar, Dr. B.R. The Essential Writings of B.R. Ambedkar. Ed. Valerian Rodrigues. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2002.

Beltz, Johannes. Mahar, Buddhist and Dalit: Religious Conversion and Socio-Political Emancipation. New Delhi: Manohar, 2005.

Boo, Katherine. Behind The Beautiful Forevers. New York: Random House. 2012.

Chakma, Utpala. Student in the three year Bachelor’s degree program in Buddhist Studies and Ambedkar Thought at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India. Personal Interview. November, 19, 2012.

Dewey, John. A Common Faith. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. 1934.

Dhammadarashi, Deepak. Dhamma student and Dalit activist involved at Manuski, Pune, India. Personal Interview. November 26, 2012.

Dharmachari, Manidhamma. Principle of the Bachelors’ degree program in Buddhist Studies and Ambedkar Thought at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India. November 15, 2012.

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Mahon, Hanna. Peace and Justice Studies Major at Middlebury College and fellow student on Antioch Education Abroad: Buddhist Studies in Bodh Gaya, Pune, India. Personal Communication. November 28, 2012.

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Queen, Christopher S.”Dr. Ambedkar and the Hermeneutics of Buddhist Liberation.” Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia. Ed. Christopher S. Queen and Sallie B. King. Albany: State University of New York Press. 1996. 62.

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Sushant. Meditation teacher at Manuski Center, Pune, India. Personal Interview. November, 23, 2012.

Turner, Victor. “The Center Out there: Pilgrim’s Goal.”A History of Religions. Vol 13. No. 3. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1973.

Vivekiratna. Residential Director at Nagaloka Institute, Nagpur, India. Personal Interview. November 18, 2012.

Yurlova, Eugenia. “Social Equality and Democracy in Ambedkar’s Understanding of Buddhism.” Reconstructing the World. Ed. Surendra Jodhale and Johannes Beltz. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2004.