ABSTRACT
For the two decades after independence both Ambedkar and the Dalits were totally ignored. The statue of Ambedkar at the Parliament came up in 1967 in response to the land satyagraha. The co-opting overtures of the Congress and growing opportunism of Dalit leaders began showing up in the weakness of Dalits in general, and manifesting into atrocities on them. The Dalit Panthers' tryst with radical politics proved still born. Kanshi Ram took a qualitative leap by stepping into the political arena, launching the Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti, creatively abbreviated as DS4 on 6 December 1981. The Manifesto published in 1973 exposed the inherent contradictions in the Dalit movement. Bamcef still survives, like any other Dalit organisation, but with a lost aura and multiple fractions. In an executive committee meeting of the Scheduled Castes Federation (SCF) on 30 September 1956, chaired by Ambedkar, a decision was taken to dissolve the SCF and form a new party, the Republican Party of India (RPI).
