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| Validating Dalit Literature as a Tool to Awakening Dalit Consciousness — A representative image. |
File Information
| Document Information | Details |
|---|---|
| Title | Validating Dalit literature as a tool to awakening Dalit consciousness |
| Article Credit | International Journal of Health Sciences, ISSN: 2550-6978, Vol.: 6, Issue: S3, Year: 2022, (Pubd in: researchgate.net) |
| Author | Kumari Kamlesh (Research Scholar, Department of Humanities, Maharashi Markandeshwar (Deemed to be University) Mullana) Syal Jyoti (Assistant Professor, Department of Humanities, Maharashi Markandeshwar (Deemed to be University) Mullana) |
| Subject | This article analyzes Dalit literature as a vehicle for awakening Dalit consciousness through social protest, self-assertion, and emancipation. It links literary expression to caste discrimination, education, and the wider Dalit movement in India. |
| Category | Academic article |
| Institution | International Journal of Health Sciences |
| Main Topics | Dalit literature, Dalit consciousness, social protest, caste discrimination, untouchability, Dalit movement, education and empowerment, Ambedkarian thought |
| Number of Pages | 12 |
| Language | English |
| File Type | |
| File Size | 231.7 KB |
Summary Note of this Document
Validating Dalit literature as a tool to awakening Dalit consciousness
This article examines Dalit literature as a means of awakening Dalit consciousness in India. It argues that Dalit writing is not merely aesthetic expression but a collective form of social protest shaped by caste oppression, untouchability, poverty, and exclusion. The paper traces how Dalit consciousness emerges from lived suffering and becomes a mode of self-assertion, dignity, and emancipation for marginalized communities. It situates Dalit literature within the history of Dalit mobilization, referencing the Progressive Writers' Association, the Dalit Panthers, and the broader post-independence literary and political context. The discussion emphasizes that Dalit writing gives voice to experiences mainstream literature often ignores, especially social discrimination, humiliation, and denial of rights. It also highlights the importance of education as a tool of upliftment and links the movement to reformers and thinkers such as B. R. Ambedkar and Jyotiba Phule. The article further considers Dalit aesthetics, the rejection of conventional literary standards, and the role of writers in building collective consciousness through protest, identity formation, and resistance to caste hierarchy.
Core Themes
- Dalit literature as protest
- collective Dalit consciousness
- caste oppression and untouchability
- education as emancipation
- Ambedkar and Dalit upliftment
Keywords
About Dr. B. R. Ambedkar
Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar was born in 1891 as the fourteenth and youngest child of an army Subedar in Mhow. Born into the Mahar caste, which was considered untouchable, Bhimrao faced many hardships at school. He had to sit on a gunny sack that he brought from home. He was not allowed to touch the water vessel or cup, so he could drink water only when the school peon was present to pour it for him. He later described this experience with the words, “No peon, no water.” His mother died when he was very young, and he had a difficult childhood. However, he was the only one of his siblings to pass his examinations and continue to high school, becoming the first person from his community to attend Elphinstone College. With a scholarship from the Maharaja of Baroda, he went on to study at Columbia University and the London School of Economics. He earned doctorates in economics and trained as a barrister at Gray’s Inn. According to the account supplied for this biography, his books were lost when his ship was torpedoed during the First World War.
Despite his education, Ambedkar continued to face prejudice. When he returned to India, he was required to work in Baroda but had to leave the position because of discrimination. His business providing investment consultancy failed when clients learned that he belonged to a community considered untouchable. While working as a professor in Mumbai, his colleagues objected to the idea of him sharing a water jug with his students. These experiences helped spur his activism. He established newspapers to give a voice to marginalized people. He led the Mahad Satyagraha, asserting Dalits’ right to collect water from a public tank, and publicly burned the Manusmriti in 1927. In 1932, he negotiated the Poona Pact with Mahatma Gandhi. Although it involved a difficult compromise, the pact provided reserved seats in legislatures for the Depressed Classes. Ambedkar was outspoken in public life but private by nature. His wife Ramabai died in 1935, and he filled his home in Bombay with a large personal library reported to contain more than 50,000 books. He declared, “I am born a Hindu, but I will not die as one.”
During the period of Indian independence, Jawaharlal Nehru invited Ambedkar to become India’s first Law Minister. Ambedkar chaired the Drafting Committee that prepared the Constitution of India, which abolished the practice of untouchability and established civil liberties and constitutional safeguards, including reservations for historically oppressed communities. He acknowledged the contribution of other constitutional experts, including B. N. Rau, who had prepared an earlier draft. Because of his poor health, including diabetes, Ambedkar married Savita, a doctor who cared for him. In October 1956, he converted to Buddhism in Nagpur along with a vast gathering of followers, commonly estimated at around half a million. He died in his sleep just weeks later, shortly after completing his final major work, The Buddha and His Dhamma. He was posthumously awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1990. His message, “Educate, agitate, organise,” continues to inspire people seeking equality and social justice.
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