Rana Sanga controversy: SP’s Baba Saheb Ambedkar Vahini to launch national campaign on Dalit atrocities

The Baba Saheb Ambedkar Vahini, a wing of the Samajwadi Party, on Tuesday declared that it would go to every part of the state to expose the atrocities committed on Dalits under the state government which stood as a mute spectator to them.

 

The body’s national general secretary, Ram Babu Sudarshan, said that in all Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states such atrocities were rampant.

 

In Uttar Pradesh, the matter revolves around Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament, Ramji Lal Suman.  

 

Suman landed himself in a soup in the last week of March when he labelled Rana Sanga, the Maharana of Mewar, a ‘traitor’. He has refused to apologise for the remark, despite an attack on his home a couple of days after he first made that remark.

 

On Monday, Samajwadi Party president, Akhilesh Yadav had said that Suman was being targeted because he was a Dalit and also because he was raising his community’s issues. Those who were attacking him enjoyed the patronage of the state’s ruling BJP.

 

In the latest attack on Suman on Sunday, 19 tyres were thrown at his convoy when he was on his way to Bulandshahr. This sent the vehicles off course and they collided with each other. The Karni Sena has taken responsibility for the attacks on Suman.

 

Yadav has tied in the matter to the larger issue of the BJP’s attitude towards the PDA (Pichda, Dalit, Alpasankhyak) umbrella vote bank that he is trying to appease. He has done this by highlighting the low numbers from these communities who are posted as police station incharges in the state.

 

Meanwhile, the Vahini has questioned that, “If a MP can be openly attacked what would the condition of an ordinary Dalit be in the state?”

 

Sudarshan said that was being openly threatened with death by goons protected by the government.

 

He also highlighted an incident in Manipuri where a statue of Baba Saheb Ambedkar was allegedly uprooted by a JCB. He said that such instances of insult to Ambedkar had become common in the state.

India