Ahmedabad: Gujarat govt has withdrawn a book on Dr B R Ambedkar reportedly because it contained “anti-Hindu” content. The book was distributed to students of Class VI-VIII in govt primary schools across the state, as part of Dr Ambedkar’s 125th birth anniversary celebrations.
The govt took the decision to withdraw the book after it found that the publisher had added the “22 vows” Ambedkar prescribed during the mass religious conversion of 1956, in which thousands of his followers shed Hinduism and embraced Buddhism. The book, Rashtriya Mahapurush Bharat Ratna Dr B R Ambedkar, written in Gujarati by Dalit scholar PA Parmar, was selected by the state govt ’s Department of Social Justice & Empowerment — the same department that ordered the recall.
The department is leading the programme on the year-long celebrations, which started on Ambedkar’s birth anniversary, April 14, 2015. The book was distributed to students so they could prepare for a state-level quiz competition on Ambedkar. Dr Ambedkar had read out 22 vows at a mass conversion ceremony in Nagpur on Oct.15, 1956. In the vows, Ambedkar stated that Hinduism was “based on inequality” and denounced Hindu deities and rituals.