‘Dalits still need separate electorates’

HYDERABAD: Speakers at the book launch of Raja Sekhar Vundru’s ‘Ambedkar, Gandhi and Patel: The Making of India’s Electoral System’, in Hyderabad on Tuesday spoke on how even 85 years since the Poona Pact, there is still a dire need of having separate electorates in the country for Dalits as the present system of joint electorates with some constituencies reserved for SC, ST and OBCs is not resulting in any real representation of the weaker sections.

The signing of Poona Pact in 1932 ended the possibility of separate electorates for dalits proposed by BR Ambedkar for ensuring their true representation in the Parliament and empowering their participation in Indian democracy, the speakers opined. Vundru, a senior bureaucrat with the Haryana government, while speaking to Express on the sidelines of the book launch stressed on need for electoral reforms to introduce separate electorates for Dalits in India. 

He said, “Having separate electorates is possible and practical. Only a Constitutional ammendment has to be brought in. A separate list of voters will also have to be prepared, which is not difficult.” Vundru said that Dr Ambedkar always supported the first-past-the-post electoral system against the proportional representation system and mentioned various ways in which it can be implemented. 

The book launch was also attended by senior Congress leader, S Jaipal Reddy, who also stressed on separate electorates in India for dalits. He spoke of how reading Ambedkar’s works in his youth shaped his thinking and how the main difference between Gandhi, Nehru and Ambedkar was of the priorities. However, Reddy criticised Ambedkar for not becoming a complete socialist, to which Vundru said that in 1947, Ambedkar did pen a document on state socialism. 

Former Chief Secretary of AP government, Kaki Madhava Rao, CPM Politburo member BV Raghavulu, Former UPSC member KS Chalam, and Director of Center for Dalit Studies YB Satyanarayana also spoke at the event. Mallepalli Laxmaiah, Chairman of CDS moderated the event. 
The book was praised also for bringing Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel into the discussion.