(1) The President may with respect to any State or Union Territory, and where it is a State, after consultation with the Governor threof, by public notification, specify the tribes or tribal communities or parts of or groups within tribes or tribal communities which shall for the purposes of this Constitution be deemed to be Scheduled Tribes in relation to that State or Union Territory, as the case may be
(2) Parliament may by law include in or exclude from the list of Scheduled Tribes specified in a notification issued under clause (1) any tribe or tribal community or part of or group within any tribe or tribal community, but save as aforesaid a notification issued under the said clause shall not be varied by any subsequent notification PART XVII OFFICIAL LANGUAGE CHAPTER I LANGUAGE OF THE UNION.
(1) The President may with respect to any State or Union Territory, and where it is a State after consultation with the Governor threof, by public notification, specify the castes, races or tribes or parts of or groups within castes, races or tribes which shall for the purposes of this Constitution be deemed to be Scheduled Castes in relation to that State or Union Territory, as the case may be
(2) Parliament may by law include in or exclude from the list of Scheduled Castes specified in a notification issued under clause (1) any caste, race or tribe or part of or group within any caste, race or tribe, but save as aforesaid a notification issued under the said clause shall not be varied by any subsequent notification.
16. Equality of opportunity in matters of public employment
(1) There shall be equality of opportunity for all citizens in matters relating to employment or appointment to any office under the State
(2) No citizen shall, on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, descent, place of birth, residence or any of them, be ineligible for, or discriminated against in respec or, any employment or office under the State.
(3) Nothing in this article shall prevent Parliament from making any law prescribing, in regard to a class or classes of employment or appointment to an office under the Government or, or any local or other authority within, a State or Union Territory, any requirement as to residence within that State or Union Territory prior to such employment or appointment.
(4) Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from makinga any provision for the reservation of appointments or posts in favour of any backward class of citizens which, in the opinion of the State, is not adequately represented in the services under the State.
(5) Nothing in this article shall affect the operation of any law which provides that the incumbent of an office in connection with the affairs of any religious or denominational institution or any member of the governing body thereof shall be a person professing a particular religion or belonging to a particular denomination.
15. Prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth
(1) The State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion, race, caste,sex, place of birth or any of them
(2) No citizen shall, on grounds only of religiong, race, case, sex, place of birth or any of them, be subject to any disability, liability, restriction or condition with regard to:
(2) (a) access to shops, public restaurants, hotels and places of public entertainmentl; or
(2) (b) the use of wells, tanks, bathing ghats, roads and places of public resort maintained wholly or partly out of State funds or dedicated to the use of general public
(3) Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any special provision for women and children.
(4) Nothing in this article or in clause (2) of Article 29 shall prevent the State from making any special provision for the advancement of any socially and educationally backward classes of citizens or for the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes.
Sovereign means the independent authority of a state – that it has the power to legislate on any subject and that it is not subject to the control of any other State / external power.
Socialist
The term socialist used here refers to democratic socialism, i.e. achievement of socialist goals through democratic, evolutionary and non-violent means.
Secular
Secular means that the relationship between the government and religious groups are determined according to the constitution and law. It separates the power of the State and religion. There is no difference of religion. All religions are equally respected and there is no State religion. All the citizens of India are allowed to profess, practice and propagate their religions.
Democratic
The people of India elect their governments by a system of universal adult franchise, popularly known as “one person one vote“. The word democratic refers not only to political democracy but also to social and economic democracy.
Justice
Justice stands for rule of law, absence of arbitrariness and a system of equal rights, freedom and opportunities for all in a society. India seeks social, economic, and political justice to ensure equality to its citizens.
Liberty
The idea of liberty refers to the freedom on the activities of Indian nationals. This establishes that there are no reasonable restrictions on Indian citizens in term of what they think, their manner of expressions and the way they wish to follow up their thoughts in action. However, liberty does not mean freedom to do anything, and it must be exercised within the constitutional limits.
Equality
The term ‘equality‘ means the absence of special privileges to any section of society, and the provision of adequate opportunity of all the individuals without any discrimination.
Fraternity
This refers to a feeling of brotherhood and sisterhood and a sense of belonging with the country among its people. The Preamble declares that fraternity has to assure two things – the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the nation. The word ‘integrity‘ has been added to the Preamble by the 42nd Constitutional Amendment (1976).
Kumari Mayawati (born 15 January 1956) is an Indian politician. She has served four separate terms as Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. She is the national president of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which focuses on a platform of social change for Bahujans, more commonly known as Other Backward Castes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes as well as converted minorities from these castes. She was chief minister briefly in 1995 and again in 1997, then from 2002 to 2003 and from 2007 to 2012.
Mayawati’s rise from humble beginnings has been called a “miracle of democracy” by P. V. Narasimha Rao, former prime minister of India. In 1993 Kanshi Ram formed a coalition with the Samajwadi Party and Mayawati became the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh in 1995. She was the first female Scheduled Caste chief minister in India. In 1997 and in 2002 she was chief minister with outside support from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the second time only for a year up to 26 August 2003 due to BJP withdrawing support.
Mayawati’s tenure has attracted praise and criticism. Millions of Dalits across India view her as an icon, and refer to her as Behen-ji (sister). She has been praised for her fundraising efforts on behalf of her party and her birthdays have been widely celebrated by her supporters. The rise in her personal wealth and that of her party have been criticised as indicative of corruption.
After losing the 2012 legislative assembly elections to Akhilesh Yadav of Samajwadi Party, she resigned from her post as party leader on 7 March 2012. Later that month, she was elected to the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of Indian parliament.
Mayawati was born on 15 January 1956 at Shrimati Sucheta Kriplani Hospital, New Delhi into a Dalit family of Jatav caste. Her father Prabhu Das, was a post office employee at Badalpur village, near Dadri in Gautam Buddha Nagar. The sons in the family were sent to private schools, while the daughters went to “low-performing government schools”.
Mayawati studied for her B.A. in 1975 at the Kalindi College, University of Delhi and obtained her LL.B. from the prestigious Faculty of Law, University of Delhi in 1983. She completed a B.Ed. from Meerut University’s VMLG College, Ghaziabad, in 1976. She was working as a teacher in Inderpuri JJ Colony, Delhi, and studying for the Indian Administrative Services exams, when Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and Other backward castes politician Kanshi Ram visited her family home in 1977. According to biographer Ajoy Bose, Ram told her: “I can make you such a big leader one day that not one but a whole row of IAS officers will line up for your orders.” Kanshi Ram included her as a member of his team when he founded the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in 1984. Mayawati was first elected to Parliament in 1989.
Kanshi Ram (15 March 1934 – 9 October 2006), also known as Bahujan Nayak or Manyavar or Saheb, was an Indian politician and social reformer who worked for the upliftment and political mobilisation of the Bahujans, the backward or lower caste people including untouchable groups at the bottom of the caste system in India. Towards this end, Kanshi Ram founded Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DS-4), the All India Backward (SC,ST,OBC..) and Minorities Communities Employees’ Federation (BAMCEF) in 1971 and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in 1984. He ceded leadership of the BSP to his protégé Mayawati who has served four terms as Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh.
Kanshi Ram was born to a Ramdasia family of Chamar caste on 15 March 1934 in Ropar district, Punjab, British India. Some sources say his birthplace was the village of Pirthipur Bunga and others that it was Khawaspur village.
After studies at various local schools, Ram graduated in 1956 with a BSc degree from Government College Ropar.
Kanshi Ram joined the offices of the Explosive Research and Development Laboratory in Pune under the government’s reservation quota for Schedule caste, Schedule tribe and Other backward castes. It was at this time that he first experienced caste discrimination and in 1964 he became an activist. Those who admire him point out that he was spurred to this after reading B. R. Ambedkar’s book Annihilation of Caste and witnessing the discrimination against a Dalit employee who wished to observe a holiday celebrating Ambedkar’s birth. Kanshi Ram strongly inspired by B. R. Ambedkar and his philosophy.
Ram initially supported the Republican Party of India (RPI) but became disillusioned with its co-operation with the Indian National Congress. In 1971, he founded the All India SC, ST, OBC and Minority Employees Association and in 1978 this became BAMCEF, an organisation that aimed to persuade educated members of the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backwards Classes and Minorities to support Ambedkarite principles. BAMCEF was neither a political nor a religious body and it also had no aims to agitate for its purpose. Suryakant Waghmore says it appealed to “the class among the Dalits that was comparatively well-off, mostly based in urban areas and small towns working as government servants and partially alienated from their untouchable identities”.
Later, in 1981, Ram formed another social organisation known as Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DSSSS, or DS4). He started his attempt of consolidating the Dalit vote and in 1984 he founded the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). He fought his first election in 1984 from Janjgir-Champa seat in Chhattisgarh. The BSP found success in Uttar Pradesh, initially struggled to bridge the divide between Dalits and Other Backward Classes but later under leadership of Mayawati bridged this gap.
In 1982 he wrote his book The Chamcha Age, in which he used the term chamcha (stooge) to describe Dalit leaders such as Jagjivan Ram and Ram Vilas Paswan. He argued that Dalits should work politically for their own ends rather than compromise by working with other parties.
After forming BSP Ram said the party would fight first election to lose, next to get noticed and the third election to win. In 1988 he contested Allahabad seat up against a future Prime Minister V. P. Singh and performed impressively but lost polling close to 70,000 votes.
He unsuccessfully contested from East Delhi (Lok Sabha constituency) (against HKL Bhagat) and Amethi (Lok Sabha constituency) (against Rajiv Gandhi) in 1989 and came in the third position on both the seats. Then he represented the 11th Lok Sabha (1996-1998) from Hoshiarpur, Kanshiram was also elected as member of Lok Sabha from Etawah in Uttar Pradesh.
After Demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Kanshi Ram joined hands to keep communal forces out of power by creating unity among the backward and Dalit castes and giving the popular slogan “Mile Mulayam-Kanshi Ram, Hawa mein ud gaye Jai Shri Ram”After the election, a coalition government of Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party was formed in UP under the leadership of Mulayam Singh Yadav, although due to some differences and Mayawati’s ambition, this alliance broke up in June 1995, Mayawati became first time Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh in support of BJP. In the late 1990s, Ram described the BJP as the most corrupt (mahabrasht) party in India and the Indian National Congress INC, Samajwadi Party and Janata Dal as equally corrupt. In 2001 He declared Mayawati as his successor.
Ram was a diabetic. He suffered a heart attack in 1994, an arterial clot in his brain in 1995, and a paralytic stroke in 2003. He died in New Delhi on 9 October 2006 of a severe heart attack at the age of 72. He had been virtually bed-ridden for more than two years. According to his wishes, his funeral rites were performed according to Buddhist tradition, with Mayawati lighting the pyre. His ashes were placed in an urn and kept at Prerna Sthal, where many people paid their respects.
In his condolence message, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described Ram as “one of the greatest social reformers of our time .. his political ideas and movements had a significant impact on our political evolution … He had a larger understanding of social change and was able to unite various underprivileged sections of our society and provide a political platform where their voices would be heard.” Under Ram’s leadership, the BSP won 14 parliamentary seats in the 1999 parliamentary elections.
The Education Department, Government of Maharashtra (Mumbai) published the collection of Ambedkar’s writings and speeches in different volumes:
Castes in India: Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development and 11 other essays.
Ambedkar in the Bombay Legislature, with the Simon Commission and at the Round Table Conferences 1927-1939
Philosophy of Hinduism; India and the Pre-requisites of Communism, Revolution and Counter-revolution; Buddha and Karl Marx
Riddles in Hinduism
Essays on Untouchables and Untouchability
The Evolution of Provincial Finance in British India
The Untouchables Who Were They and Why They Became Untouchables?
The Annihilation of Caste (1936)
Who wre the Shudras? (1946)
Pakistan or the Partition of India
What Congress and Gandhi have done to the Untouchables; Mr. Gandhi and the Emancipation of the Untouchables.
Ambedkar as member of the Governor General’s Executive Council, 1942-46
The Buddha and His Dhamma
Unpublished writings: Ancient Indian Commerce; Notes on laws; Waiting for a Visa; Misellaneous notes, etc.
Ambedkar as the principal architect of the Constitution of India
(2 parts) Dr. Ambedkar and The Hindu Code Bill
Ambedkar as Free India’s First Law Minister and Member of Opposition in Indian Parliament (1947-1956)
The Pali Grammar
Ambedkar and his Egalitarian Revolution – Struggle for Human Rights. Events starting from March 1927 to 17 November 1956 in the chronological order; Ambedkar and his Egalitarian Revolution – Soci-political and religious activities. Events starting from November 1929 to 8 May 1956 in the chronological order; Ambedkar and his Egalitarian Revolution – Speeches. (Events starting from 1 January to 20 November 1956 in the chronolgical order.)
“Who Tried to turn the wheel of Law toward social justice for all.“
He said:
Cultivation of mind should be the ultimate aim of human existence.
For a successful revolution it is not enough that there is discontent. What is required is a profound and thorough conviction of the justice, necessity and importance of polotical and social rights.
A people and their religion must be judged by social standard based on ethics. No other standard would have any meaning if religion is held to be necessary good for the well-being of the people.
Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (14 April 1891 – 6 December 1956) was an Indian jurist, economist, social reformer and political leader who headed the committee drafting the Constitution of India from the Constituent Assembly debates, served as Law and Justice minister in the first cabinet of Jawaharlal Nehru, and inspired the Dalit Buddhist movement after renouncing Hinduism.
Ambedkar graduated from Elphinstone College, University of Bombay, and studied economics at Columbia University and the London School of Economics, receiving doctorates in 1927 and 1923 respectively and was among a handful of Indian students to have done so at either institution in the 1920s. He also trained in the law at Gray’s Inn, London. In his early career, he was an economist, professor, and lawyer. His later life was marked by his political activities; he became involved in campaigning and negotiations for India’s independence, publishing journals, advocating political rights and social freedom for Dalits, and contributing significantly to the establishment of the state of India. In 1956, he converted to Buddhism, initiating mass conversions of Dalits.
In 1990, the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian award, was posthumously conferred on Ambedkar. The salutation Jai Bhim (lit. “Hail Bhim”) used by followers honours him. He is also referred to by the honorific Babasaheb (BAH-bəSAH-hayb).
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as The Buddha, was a śramaṇa (wandering ascetic) and religious teacher who lived during the 6th or 5th century BCE in South Asia. He was the founder of Buddhism and is revered by Buddhists as a fully awakened being who taught a path to Nirvana (lit. vanishing or extinguishing), that is, freedom from ignorance, craving, rebirth and suffering.
According to Buddhist tradition, the Buddha was born in Lumbini in what is now Nepal, to royal parents of the Shakya clan, but renunciated his home life to live as a wandering ascetic. Leading a life of begging, asceticism, and meditation, he attained enlightenment at Bodh Gaya in what is now India, gaining liberating insight into the workings of the cycle of rebirth and how it can be escaped. The Buddha thereafter wandered through the lower Gangetic plain, teaching and building a monastic order. He taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and severe asceticism, a training of the mind that included ethical training and meditative practices such as effort, mindfulness, and jhana. He died in Kushinagar, attaining paranirvana. The Buddha has since been venerated by numerous religions and communities across Asia.
A couple of centuries after his death he came to be known by the title Buddha, which means “Awakened One” or “Enlightened One.” His teachings were compiled by the Buddhist community in the Vinaya, his codes for monastic practice, and the Suttas, texts based on his discourses. These were passed down in Middle Indo-Aryan dialects through an oral tradition. Later generations composed additional texts, such as systematic treatises known as Abhidharma, biographies of the Buddha, collections of stories about his past lives known as Jataka tales, and additional discourses, i.e. the Mahayana sutras.
