410 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
Depressed Classes is to secure for them land so that they may work as independent farmers. There are many parts of the Bombay Presidency in which there is waste land. Government leases this waste land at a rental for anyone who cares to take it for cultivation. Before the Institute came into existence the whole of this Government waste land used to be given to caste Hindu farmers. Applicants from the Depressed Classes never got a single piece of this waste land from the Revenue Officials who had the power of disposal, the Institute has ever since its establishment, fought for the right of the Depressed Classes to get for cultivation, a fair share of this land and suceeded in getting the policy of the Government in regard to the disposal of such land modified by a favoured treatment proviso applicable to the Depressed Classes. It may now be said to the credit of the Institute that, by its efforts, quite a number of Depressed Classes families, which were earning their living as agricultural labourers, have risen to the status of independent farmers.
Need of the Institute
The principle needs of the Institute are three. First is the enlargement of its Printing Establishment. The Institute maintains a Printing Press of its own called the Bharat Bhushan Punting Press. The purpose in having a press of its own has been two-fold. One purpose was to have no difficulty in printing the newspaper ‘Janata’ which the Institute conducts and other propagnada literature which the Institute issues from time to time. The other and more important purpose was to make the Printing Press a source of income to finance the activities of the Institute. The Printing Press, however, far from being a source of income has been a burden to the Institute. The Printing Press being very small in its equipment., the Institute is not able to take either book-work or job-work at the competitive rates prevailing in the market, the cost of production on a small machine being relatively high. The Institute must either enlarge the equipment of the Press or do without the Press. The latter alternative is impossible under the present circumstances of India, for there is always the probability of a conspiracy among printers who are mostly caste Hindus to refuse to print a newspaper run by the Depressed Classes. The second need of the Institute is for a building of its own for its headquarters in Bombay. The Institute is, at present, not housed