mention the way to maintain our democracy, according to Dr.Babasaheb Ambedkar.
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All over India the 51st death anniversary of Dr B.R. Ambedkar is being observed on December 6, 2007. He was a genius par excellence—an economist a sociologist, a political scientist, a great historian, a legal luminary, a great constitutionalist and above all a great champion of the downtrodden.
Abraham Lincoln says: “As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.” Various philosophers, political scientists and writers have given numerous definitions of democracy. A relentless champion of human rights and staunch believer in democracy, Dr Ambedkar says: “Democracy is not a form of government, but a form of social organisation.”
Dr Ambedkar believed that in democracy revolutionary changes in the economic and social life of the people are brought about without bloodshed. The conditions for that are as follows: “(1) there should not be glaring inequalities in society, that is, privilege for one class; (2) the existence of an opposition; (3) equality in law and administration; (4) observance of constitutional morality; (5) no tyranny of the majority; (6) moral order of society: and (7) public conscience.”
Addressing the Constituent Assembly, he suggested certain devices essential to maintain democracy: “(i) constitutional methods: (ii) not to lay liberties at the feet of a great man: (iii) make a political democracy a social democracy.”
Dr Ambedkar firmly believed that political democracy cannot succeed without social and economic democracy. In his talk given on the Voice of America he argued that: “Democracy could not be equated with either republic or parliamentary form of government. The roots of democracy lay not in the form of government, parliamentary or otherwise. A democracy is a model of associated living. The roots of democracy are to be searched in social relationship, in terms of the associated life between the people who form the society.”
He was against coercive centralised institu-tional authority that Hobbesian Philosophy maintains. Associated life is consensual expression of shared experience, aspirations and values. If a small section of the society is allowed to manipulate the cultured symbols of the society that process becomes undemocratic and destructive.
For him political democracy is not an end in itself, but the most powerful means to achieve the social and economic ideals in society. State socialism within the framework of parliamentary democracy can defeat dictatorship. Fundamental rights without economic security are of no use to the have-nots. “Social and economic democracy are tissue and the fibre of a political democracy.”
In a multi-denominational society like India, the common denominator is secularism which is one of the pillars on which the superstructure of our democracy rests. It is a unifying force of our associated life. He says: “The conception of a secular state is derived from the liberal democratic tradition of the West. No institution which is maintained wholly out of state funds shall be used for the purpose of religious instruction irrespective of the question whether the religious instruction is given by the state or by any other body.” Participating in a debate in Parliament, he further emphasised: “It (secular state) does not mean that we shall not take into consideration the religious sentiments of the people. All that a secular state means that this Parliament shall not be competent to impose any particular religion upon the rest of the people. That is the only limitation that the Constitution recognises.”
Social unity can be achieved by coercive methods. For true democracy to flower and flourish, social union is must. For that he suggested safeguards for the minority. In democracy, minority does not become the victim of the tyranny of the majority. He suggested certain safeguards for the protection of the minority. “The State should guarantee to its citizens the liberty of conscience and the free exercise of his religion including the right to profess, to preach and to convert within limits compatible with public order and morality.”
The way to maintain our democracy, according to Babasaheb Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar is as follows.
- According to him, we must follow the constitutional methods for achieving the social and economic objectives of the nation. By this, he means to say that the bloody methods of revolution must be abandoned. There can be no justification for the unconstitutional methods.
- Further, according to Dr. Ambedkar, we must always avoid hero worship, no matter how great a leader is. Hero worship is a sure way toward the degradation of democratic institutions.