320 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
How could a party take roots when its followers did not know in clear terms what were doctrinal differences between the party to which they belonged and the party to which they were asked to oppose. So the failure to enunciate the doctrine of differences between the Brahminical sections and the Non-Brahmins was one of the reasons for the downfall of the party. The second reason for the downfall of the party was, it had very narrow political programme. The party had been described by its opponents as a party of job-hunters. That was the term the ‘Hindu’ had often used. I do not attach much importance to this criticism; for “If we are jobhunters, then the other side are no less than we are.” One defect in the political programme of the Non- Brahmin Party had been that the party made it, its chief concern to secure a certain number of jobs for their youngmen. That was perfectly legitimate. But did Non-Brahmin youngmen for whom the party fought for twenty years to secure jobs in public services remember the Party after they had received emoluments for their jobs ? During the twenty years the party had been in office, it forgot the 90% of the Non-Brahmins living in the villages, leading an uneconomical life and getting into the clutches of the money-lenders.
I have examined the legislations enacted during this period and except for one solitary measure of land reform, the Non-Brahmin Party never bothered about the tenants and the peasants. That was the “Congress fellows stole their clothes quietly.”
I have been greatly pained by the turn of the events. One thing I would like to impress was that a party was the only thing that would save them. A party needed a good leader, a party needed an organisation, a party needed a political platform.
But let us be too critical about leaders. Let us look at the Congress. Who would have accepted Mahatma Gandhi as a leader in any other country ? He was a man who had no vision, no knowledge, no judgement. He was a man who had been a failure all his life in public life. There was no important occassion when India was about to succeed when Mr. Gandhi had brought anything good. When Mr. Jinnah raised his Pakistan issue, two