Editing Dalit Panthers (section)

== The Manifesto ==

=== Date and Authorship ===

The ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'' is an eight-page document written in the collective voice of the organization.<ref name="Manifesto" /> It opens by marking one year since the founding, which is consistent with 1973, and its title page reads Bombay, 1973. Yet on its second page it describes Congress rule as lasting "from 1947 to 1974," a span that is exact only if the text was finalized in 1974, and it discusses the 1972 general election and its aftermath as settled history.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', pp. 1, 2, 4.</ref> Gopal Guru cites the document as a Mumbai publication of 1974.<ref name="Guru2021">Guru, Gopal (2021). "New-Buddhism, Marxism and the Caste Question in India". In: Gokhale, Pradeep P. (Ed.), ''Classical Buddhism, Neo-Buddhism and the Question of Caste'': 111–126. London: Routledge.</ref> Two explanations are possible: that the text was drafted in 1973 and finalized in early 1974, or that the title page and the arithmetic simply disagree for an unknown reason. The question is unresolved, and this page cites the manifesto as 1973 by its title page. The manifesto names neither Dhasal nor Dhale, so statements in it cannot be assumed to be the personal views of either.

=== Who Is a Dalit? Friends and Enemies ===

The manifesto defines a "dalit" broadly, as members of the scheduled castes and tribes, Neo-Buddhists, the working people, the landless and poor peasants, women, and all others exploited politically, economically, and in the name of religion.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 6.</ref> Neo-Buddhists are thus one constituency among several, and not the movement's defining identity. Its friends are revolutionary parties committed to ending caste and class rule, described as "Left parties that are left in a true sense"; its enemies are landlords, capitalists, and moneylenders and their allies, together with parties that engage in religious or casteist politics and the government that depends on them.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 6.</ref>

=== Ambedkar, the Republican Party, and the Left ===

The manifesto names Jotiba Phule and Ambedkar as the movement's two great leaders,<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 2.</ref> yet it repudiates the Republican Party, Ambedkar's former political vehicle: the Panthers declare themselves "no blood relatives" of that party and accuse its leaders of trading on Ambedkar's name for personal gain. The manifesto also states that 1,117 Dalits were murdered over a period of one and a half years, a figure that it gives without corroboration.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 5.</ref> The only programme of substance that it credits from the Republican Party era is the satyagraha of the landless led by Dadasaheb Gaekwad.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 5.</ref> The document is severe on Gandhi, in judgments that it largely presents as Ambedkar's, and on the Congress Party, which it treats as a continuation of "old Hindu feudalism."<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 3 (Gandhi).</ref> It also criticizes the Communist Party of India for opportunism in the united-front politics of 1967 and for failing to combine class struggle with the struggle against untouchability.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 4.</ref>

=== Religion and the Eighteen-Point Programme ===

The manifesto presents Ambedkar's later turn to a scientific outlook, class consciousness, and "a completely atheistic approach" as the necessary basis of effective politics.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 5.</ref> Its eighteen-point programme, set out on pages 7 and 8, calls for land redistribution under the Land Ceiling Act, the end of caste bars on employment, wells, and village residence, the abolition of exploitation by private capital, the building of socialism in India, and free education, medical care, and housing.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', pp. 7–8.</ref> It also calls for an end to government grants to religious institutions, for the use of the wealth of religious places for the benefit of Dalits, and for a ban on religious and casteist literature.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973), ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto'', p. 8.</ref> Nothing in the programme is framed in Buddhist doctrinal terms.