Exploring B. R. Ambedkar’s Sociology: A Biographical Approach

Abstract

B. R. Ambedkar, a polymath and an untiring social activist, had several important ideas about the Indian socio-cultural reality. But he has so far been denied a rightful place in the annals of development of Indian sociology. Perusal of Ambedkar’s ideas and course of action to realize them immediately unravel the problems of: (a) analysing the nature of interface of tradition and modernity in India, a country endowed or burdened with a millennia-old tradition and challenged by modernity; (b) assessing the nature of ‘social exclusion’ (a concept innovated by Ambedkar before anybody else in India or abroad) practised by the savarna, following Brahminical injunctions, against the numerous (ex-)untouchables of India; (c) adequately realizing the nature of ‘lived experience’ of the socially ostracized by those who lack in the taste of the lived experience. Associated with it is the problem besetting attempts at theorization of ‘distinctive’ predicament of the dalits. The dilemma, hitherto neglected by scholars, confronting Ambedkar and other dalits in facing the ‘two leeches’ then tormenting the Indian/Hindu society, viz., the British and the Brahminical rule, merits attention. The paper seeks to also explain the apparent contradiction between Ambedkar’s sharing of Ranade’s grief over the defeat of the Marathas by the British at the Battle of Khadki (Kirkee) and his celebration of the event at Bheema Koregaon.