254 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
in the House of Commons that my influence was confined to Bombay and C.P. How is it then that I was elected from Bengal? In connection with my election, I would like to impress upon you three facts : One is that I did not merely scrape through but I came at the top of the poll beating even Mr. Sarat Chandra Bose, the topmost Bengalee leader of the Congress Party. Secondly, I am in no way connected by communal ties with the Scheduled Castes community of Bengal. They are of different castes to which I do not belong. In fact the people of my caste do not exist in Bengal at all and yet the Bengalee Scheduled Castes supported me, so strongly that I was able to come first. Thirdly, though the Scheduled Castes in Bengal had been returned on the Congress ticket yet they broke the rule of their Party not to vote for anybody except for Congressmen and voted for me. Does this prove that I have no following in Bengal ? I am sure if the Cabinet Mission are honest in their conclusion, they ought to revise the erroneous opinion which they have expressed in the House of Commons and revise the view and give proper recognition to the Federation.
- With regard to the status of the Scheduled Castes in the Minority Advisory Committee, I am glad to have an assurance that the British Cabinet considers the Scheduled Castes to be an important minority. I am afraid that I must again repeat that unless and untill the Cabinet Mission were to make a public declaration, this view will not help the Scheduled Castes. I say this because, as you will see, (in) the last letter which Maulana Abul Kalam Azad wrote to the Viceroy on behalf of the Congress before the negotiations broke down, he emphatically challenged the view that the Scheduled Castes were a minority. The Scheduled Castes fear that if this view is not corrected by the British Cabinet in time, the Scheduled Castes’ case may not be considered in the Advisory Committee which is bound to be packed by Congressmen. The danger of their being relegated to the position of a social group within the Hindus as distinguished from a minority, appears to be most certain in view of the recent pronouncement of Mr. Gandhi who evidently thinks that he can now do anything he likes with the Scheduled Castes in view of the fact that the British Government have refused to lend them their support.