Editing Dalit Buddhism (section)

== After 1956 ==

The sources consulted for this page document the period after 1956 unevenly. The following summaries cover only the strands that have been researched; the post-1960 history of Ambedkarite organizations, parties, and writers is a gap waiting to be addressed.

=== The Dalit Panthers ===

{{Main|Dalit Panthers}}

The Dalit Panthers were founded in Bombay in 1972 by the poet [[Namdeo Dhasal]] (1949–2014) and Raja Dhale (1940–2019). Their manifesto defines "dalit" broadly, to include Neo-Buddhists as one constituency among several, and presents a programme of land redistribution, anti-capitalism, and opposition to institutional religion; the programme is not framed in Buddhist terms.<ref>Dalit Panthers (1973). ''Dalit Panthers Manifesto''. Bombay. 8 pp., p. 6 (the definition of "dalit") and pp. 7–8 (the programme). The imprint year is unresolved: the title page reads 1973, Gopal Guru cites the document as 1974, and the text counts Congress rule "from 1947 to 1974".</ref> Buddhist identity is therefore present in the movement but is not its organizing principle. Hovell reports that Dhasal was among the ex-Untouchables who converted to Buddhism following Ambedkar; the evidence concerning him is of a personal Buddhist identity and not of Buddhist political thought.<ref>Hovell, Laurie (1991). "Namdeo Dhasal: Poet and Panther". ''Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars'' 23(2): 77–83.</ref> Hunt reports that the Hindi Dalit autobiographical field took inspiration from the Marathi literature associated with the Panthers.<ref>Hunt (2014), ''Hindi Dalit Literature'', pp. 3, 139, 181, 184.</ref>

=== Marx and Ambedkar ===

{{Main|Marxist Interpretations of Buddhism in India}}

Gopal Guru credits the Panthers' manifesto as the first document to bring Ambedkar and Marx together.<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, p. 114.</ref> (This is his characterization and has not been checked independently.) The relation between Ambedkar's Buddhism and Marxism is debated in the secondary literature. A separate tradition of Marxist interpretation of Buddhism grew up, largely apart from the Ambedkarite movement; the exception is the Marathi historian and organizer Sharad Patil (1925–2014), who moved from the Communist Party to a "Marxism-Phule-Ambedkarism" and later to what he called "Sautrantika Marxism".

=== The Triratna Buddhist Community ===

The Triratna Bauddha Mahasangha (TBM, formerly known as TBMSG), the Indian branch of the Triratna Buddhist Community, grew out of connections between Ambedkar, Anand Kausalyayan, and the English-born teacher Sangharakshita (Dennis Lingwood, born 1925), whose Friends of the Western Buddhist Order was founded in London in 1967. Sangharakshita was active in aiding Ambedkar's work of converting and supporting Dalits, and the movement had centres in India and Nepal by the 1970s.<ref>Geary and Mukherjee (2017), "Buddhism in Contemporary India", pp. 49–50; the Handbook also treats the movement at pp. 339 and 407–408.</ref> The ''Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Buddhism'' records two mass ceremonies in the post-1990 period: Delhi on 4 November 2004 (about 20,000) and the Mahalaxmi Race Course in Mumbai on 28 May 2007 (roughly 50,000, and 100,000 according to others), many of whose participants followed the writer Laxman Mane, who had converted in October 2006.<ref>Geary and Mukherjee (2017), "Buddhism in Contemporary India", pp. 49–50.</ref>