SECHEDULED.................TRIBUNAL 365
The Congress, he said, accused the British Government of pursuing the policy of divide and rule. That was exactly the game the Congress had played, with some success, as far as the Scheduled Castes Federation was concerned at the last general elections. He had no doubt that they would try their tactics again at the forthcoming elections, but the Scheduled Castes would not fall a prey to them.
The Scheduled Castes, he added, could not hope to compete with the Congress, which had the backing of the capitalists, in the matter of organisations at the time of the elections. No cars could be provided to carry voters to the polling booths. Every Scheduled Castes voter would, he felt sure, walk to the booths and exercise his franchise, thus showing to the world that they stood solidly behind the Federation. The strength of the Federation was amply proved at the primary elections at which the supporters of the Federation far outnumbered the Congress supporters. Seeing the results, the Congress ought to have stood out of the contest, if it were true to its professions of democracy.
Referring to the purse presented to him for the election campaign, Dr. Ambedkar said that although the amount was meagre he was not worried in the least as the campaign would be “Clean, honest and straight forward.” The Congress leaders were collecting huge sums, for they would try to purchase votes.
Earlier, Mr. B. K. Gaikwad, addressing the gathering said that Mr. Gandhi had not done anything for the Scheduled Castes. He criticised Mr. Gandhi’s recent speech at Madras wherein he said that the Scheduled Castes looked to Government because they could become Rao Bahadurs or get good jobs.
Dr. Ambedkar returned from his election tour of Satara and Belgam districts on Sunday morning and will leave Bombay for New Delhi on Monday evening.” [1]
However, there were additional dimentions in the speech of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar on the subject which were reported by ‘The Free Press Journal.’ The dimentions were :
- : Jai Bheem : March 5, 1946.