Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability: Fighting the Indian Caste System Book

	Acknowledgements	vii
	Maps	xi
	Introduction: The First Dalit Leader of India	1
1	Maharashtra between Social Reform and anti-Brahmin Mobilisation	8
	Maharashtra and its socio-political system	8
	The questioning of the social order during the nineteenth century	11
2	Ambedkar: Son of a Mahar Soldier	19
	Mahars, first of the last	20
	The family environment: the army and Western education under princely patronage	26
3	Analysing and Ethnicising Caste to Eradicate it More Effectively	31
	Inventing a golden age for the lower castes: the prestige of autochthony	38
	How to resist Sanskritisation?	42
4	In the Political Arena, against Gandhi	52
	Reserved seats or separate electorates?	53
	Arm wrestling with Gandhi and the Poona Pact	59
	Ambedkar and the Arya Samaj	71
5	Searching for an Electoral Strategy	74
	The ILP, or how to defend workers without being a Marxist	74
	The Scheduled Castes' Federation and caste politics	80
	From the SCF to the RPI-a return to the ILP?	84
6	Opposition or Collaboration? Ambedkar's Pragmatism and Resilience	91
	The British-objective allies?	91
	Ambedkar, a Dalit leader in the establishment of post-1947 India	98
7	Shaping the Indian Constitution	106
	The 'False Manu'?	106
	The revenge on Gandhi of a westernised democrat	108
	The Hindu Code Bill and the break with Nehru	114
8	The 'Solution' of Conversion	119
	Conversion, a strategy of social emancipation?	120
	The choice of Buddhism as an egalitarian creed	131
9	The Impact and Relevance of Ambedkar Today	143
	The target of Gandhians and Hindu nationalists	144
	Collaborator with the British and gravedigger of social reform?	146
	The political legacy of Ambedkar: posterity or treason?	150
	Conclusion	161
	Notes	167
	Select Bibliography	198
	Index	203