28 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
determinism there is no place for merit or ability. The only thing that counts is kinship which prompts the Indian to discriminate against persons who are not his kindred. The effect of this determinism operating in the minds of the members of the majority community is bound to put members of the smaller communities at a formidable disadvantage and may indeed for ever shut them out from political power. The working out of this social determinism is bound to be most pernicious to the Depressed Classes. As you are aware the gradation of castes in India, founded as it is in theology, forms an ascending scale of reverence and a descending scale of contempt. The effect of this gradation is to create in the minds of the lower orders a preference for the members of the higher and in the minds of the higher orders a repulsion for the members of the lower. The working of such a psychology is bound to be disastrous to the Depressed Classes in their struggle for political power. Without casting a single vote in favour of the Untouchables, the touchables will be able to make a large draft upon the votes of the Untouchables who will therefore not only lose in the fight but will quite unwillingly help their opponents to win. If the effect of the ignoring of the social facts is to make the aristocracy of wealth, education and social standing the governing caste, I think it is our duty to prevent it by all means consistent with our aim. For, surely we ought not to be content with the mere change of masters. I agree with the Congressman that no country is good enough to rule over another. But I must also take the liberty to tell him pointblank that the proposition does not end there and that it is equally true that no class is good enough to rule over another class. In the competition between the members of the European bureaucracy and the native aristocracy—I am using the word to denote the combined force of wealth, education and superior social standing—as to who can best look after the masses, the aristocracy asserts that as far as knowledge of the conditions of the life of the masses, their habits, their ways of living and thinking, their wants and grievances, and ability to enter into their thoughts and appreciate what is necessary for them, are concerned, it has all these in a far higher degree than the European bureaucracy can lay claim to.