Bahujan Culture
Mangu Ram Mugowalia, Ad Dharm movement and the rise of the Ravidass Panth
Although Guru Ravidass was already a revered figure among the Untouchable community of Punjab, it was the Ad Dharm movement that used images of Guru Ravidass to great effect to concretize the newly conceived lower-caste...
Revisiting Meera and Raidas: Who was Girdhar Nagar?
Meera shedding social inhibitions was not about quitting royal life and embracing a spartan existence; it was about a widow being drawn to a man, loving him, and wanting to marry him, writes Kanwal Bharti
Shabbir Ahmed Ansari: Harbinger of Pasmanda consciousness
Shabbir Ahmed Ansari’s life shows that social reform is not only about sloganeering. It is also about making use of constitutional and legal provisions at our disposal. It was due to his efforts that reservations...
Phule’s Sarvajanik Satyadharma in times of religious hatred
What is surprising is that references to how Phule saw Islam and Christianity are totally missing from the discourse even as communalism in general and hatred against the Muslims in particular is used to nullify...
Discovering Babasaheb’s lost speeches in the West
At the time of the Round Table Conferences, Dr Ambedkar had become a sought-after speaker in the UK,...
Jotirao Phule’s ideology and literature
Phule challenged the traditional concept of literature. For him, literature was not only about aesthetics. It was a...
How Kanshi Ram’s slogans became the gospel for the masses
It is time we revived these slogans in our political spheres, in our social spaces and university corridors...
Virendra Yadav’s struggles in the ‘progressive’ camp
Virendra Yadav’s heart was riddled with barbs hurled by his ‘own’ people. But he kept fighting for secular-progressive...
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