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DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
The Congress promises to do wonders for the servile classes— the Congress speaks of masses, it ought really to speak of them as the servile classes held in bondage by the governing classes—when Swaraj comes. It says that it would like to make revolutionary changes but it has no power to make them and it must wait for Swaraj. It is this glib talk which goes to deceive the gullible foreigner. Leaving aside the boast and bluster which lie behind the statement, one may ask what really can happen if India does become a sovereign and an independent state ? One thing is certain. The governing class will not disappear by the magic wand of Swaraj. It will remain as it is and having been freed from the incubus of British Imperialism will acquire greater strength and vigour. It will capture power as the governing classes in every country do. In short, Swaraj will not be government by the people but it will be a government run by the governing class and in the absence of Government by the people, government for the people will be what the governing class will choose to make of it.
What will the governing class do when India becomes a sovereign and independent state ? Some hope that they will undertake reform of tenancy laws, enlarge factory legislation, extend primary education, introduce prohibition and train people to ply charkha, construct roads and canals, improve currency, regulate weights and measures, open dispensaries and undertake other measures to ameliorate the condition of the servile classes. No one from the servile class can be very enthusiastic about such a programme. In the first place, there is nothing very great in it. In the world of today, no governing, class can omit to undertake reforms which are necessary to maintain society in a civilized state. Personally, I have grave doubts about the governing class in India coming forward to carry out even such a modest programme of social amelioration. Most people forget that what leads the Congress today to mouth such a programme is the desire to show that the Congress is better than the British Bureaucracy. But once the bureaucracy is liquidated, will there be the same incentive to better the lot of the masses ? I entertain very grave doubts on the point. Apart from this, is social amelioration the be all and end-all of Swaraj ? Speaking for the servile classes, I have no doubt that what they expect to happen in a sovereign and free India is a complete destruction of Brahmanism as a philosophy of life and as a social order. If I may say so, the