Dalit Panthers: An Authoritative History
book review — JV Pawar documents facts, fanaticism and a movement against caste
oppression
Yogesh Maitreya
First Post : Apr 15, 2018 08:27:11 IST
JV Pawar’s recently translated book in English from
Marathi, Dalit Panthers: An Authoritative History, is the first-hand
documentation of how and why the movement of Dalit Panthers took shape in
Maharashtra and how it spread across several Indian states from south to north.
Being one of the founding members of the Dalit
Panthers, besides Namdeo Dhasal, Raja Dhale, and others, the narrative
transports us through the time that gave birth to an unprecedented anti-caste
movement, Dalit Panthers. This book not only offers us the background of the
emergence of Dalit Panthers but surprises us by telling tales behind the
stories popularised by media and literature of dominants.
Dalit Panthers — An Authoritative History. Image
courtesy: Forward PressCover of the book Dalit Panthers — An Authoritative
History. Image courtesy: Forward Press
The book is an enthusiastic read for those who are
interested in knowing history through the eyes of Dalits. In this sense, this
book, unlike those written with a dominant Brahminical imagination on Dalit Panthers,
offers us the scope to learn that history in India has many facets. It also
tells us that history, once it is written and produced as narratives, changes
with the caste-class location of a person who writes it.
Pawar, in his book, mentions incidents of
caste-atrocities, which perhaps are never heard or forgotten long before.
Therefore, this book is a rare documentation of both facts and fanaticism of
upper caste culprits who committed atrocities on Dalits. For example, in a
chapter called 'Inhuman blinding of the Gavai Brother', he mentions:
On 26 September 1974, a barbaric act was committed in
Dhakli village of Akola district. The eyes of two brothers were gouged out for
resisting injustice. The incident did not receive the attention it deserved till
I called a press conference in Mumbai on 25 January 1975. The residents of the
village had justified the act and created an impression that two local goons
had been punished. They failed to see that even if the two men had indulged in
a criminal act, they had no authority to take the law into their own hands and
mete out punishment. Nobody bothered to find out whether they were really
criminals and what their crime was.
One of the facts, as the book suggests, behind the
atrocities that went unheard and unnoticed was also the inability of the
political leaders among Dalits to address the issues and demand for justice, as
most of them either had their own separate groups such as the Republican Party
of India (RPI) or Congress had strategically co-opted them. Depicting this
awful situation about Dalit leaders, Pawar writes that “some of them went on to
become leaders but could not give up their old habits. After Dr Ambedkar’s
death, the movement disintegrated. These squabbling leaders fell prey to the
crooked politics of the Congress party that led to further division in
society”.
The result of this, claims Pawar, was that the gap
between Dalit leaders and masses widened. The restlessness and hopelessness
among the people was widespread. In such a situation, as we read in the book, a
few Dalit youths from Mumbai (then known as Bombay) mostly talented budding
writers and poets — Pawar being one of them — decided to resist the onslaught
of atrocities on Dalits. Thus, there emerged Dalit Panthers, a movement responsible
for transforming the realm of consciousness of Dalit youth in Maharashtra for
several decades.
In the absence of any written history on Dalit Panthers
by the Panthers, people's imagination of this movement could have been
different. Hence, it is in this context that Pawar’s documentation of events,
incidents, conflicts and the politics in this book makes a compulsory reading.
But the book is not only an attempt to document or write but also tell the
angst among the Dalit youth back then, and which translated into their radical
stands against caste, and drawing further, strategies to tackle the issues of
atrocities on Dalits.
Unlike the decades-long struggle in the past,
especially when Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar was alive, the Dalits under Dalit
Panthers — taking cues from the Black Panthers of America — abled themselves to
fight against oppression and oppressors, by being present at the sight of
atrocity in a group of hundred or often thousands.
This book is full of such atrocious stories presenting
the ugly face of the country. This furious sense of unity among them (the Dalit
Panthers) further provided utmost confidence to the Dalit youth that was
necessary to fight oppression by the Upper castes and articulate resistance
through poems, stories, and songs.
Pawar who has authored more than two dozen of books on
the Dalit movement has undoubtedly managed to express the anger in the form of
this book. This book is a priceless souvenir for one who aspires to resist
caste, to fight it, and to write the songs of resistance.
