Dr. B. R. Ambedkar was a thinker and patriot whose views were deep and wide. Some of those views are often ignored or twisted, especially by what is called the “Old Media” or certain academic circles tied to the left-liberal story of India. Ambedkar wrote and spoke on many topics—society, religion, democracy, justice—and some of his ideas do not fit neatly into those familiar narratives. Below are four of those ideas, drawn from his speeches, writings, and actions.

Democracy Found in the Ancient Upanishads

Ambedkar believed that to build a society based on liberty, fraternity, and equality, Hindus did not have to look beyond their own scriptures. He said this during his speech to the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal. He argued that the Upanishads already include those values.

In Riddles of Hinduism, he extended that thought. He took the three mahavakyas — Sarvam Khalvidam Brahma, Aham Brahmasmi, and Tatvamasi — and explained what their combined meaning could be. He wrote:

“To support democracy because we are all children of God is a very weak foundation for democracy to rest on. That is why democracy is so shaky wherever it made to rest on such a foundation. But to recognize and realize that you and I are parts of the same cosmic principle leaves room for no other theory of associated life except democracy. It does not merely preach democracy. It makes democracy an obligation of one and all.”

Ambedkar thus said that democracy is not just something you argue for, but something everyone must live by if you see that all beings share a common cosmic principle.

Hindu Civil Code as a First Step to Uniform Civil Code

Ambedkar rejected the unfair and cruel parts of name-smriti traditions. But he also believed these traditions could be reformed. He thought that one could take the diverse Hindu laws and customs, and distil them into a system that allowed social democracy and gender justice.

That’s why he introduced the Hindu Code Bill (HCB). Ambedkar saw it as a way to shape Hindu society into a more unified system based on liberty and equality. On 11 January 1950, in a lecture, he said:

“The present bill is progressive. This is an effort to try to have one civil law for all the citizens under the constitution of India. The law is based on the religious scriptures of the Hindus.”

For Ambedkar, the HCB was not just a political move, but a foundational tool for building a modern Indian state that respects all citizens equally.

Refusal to Give Indus Water to Pakistan Without Acknowledging Indian Farmers’ Rights

In negotiations in 1948 over water from the Indus River, Ambedkar took a firm stand. Britain’s economist Henry Vincent Hodson recorded how Ambedkar insisted that Pakistan must first accept India’s legal claim that all the water belonged to East Punjab, and that East Punjab had the right to use it as it saw fit. This demand came at a meeting on 3 May 1948 involving ministerial representatives of India and Pakistan.

When discussions broke down over this matter, the chief Pakistan representative, Mr. Gulam Mohammed, approached Lord Mountbatten. Lord Mountbatten then contacted Pandit Nehru, saying that “miserable peasants and refugees were being made to suffer” while the issue was still unsettled. Nehru agreed to reopen the talks and try to break the deadlock.

Ambedkar’s position showed that he was not willing to compromise on farmers’ rights even in heated international negotiations.

Support for Sanskrit as National / Official Language

Ambedkar also held strong views on India’s language policy. He favored Sanskrit as the national language of India. In The Sunday Hindustan Standard on 11 September 1949, it was reported that as Law Minister, Ambedkar wanted Sanskrit to be the official language of the Union. He repeated this in the Executive Committee of the All India Scheduled Caste Federation.

When questions about how to handle the issue of linguistic states arose, Ambedkar accepted that creating states on the basis of language was a dangerous path. But he believed it was a risk that “a wise and firm statesman could avert”.

He went further and made this recommendation:

“The only way I can think of meeting the danger is to provide in the Constitution that the regional language shall not be the official language of the State. The official language of the State shall be Hindi and until India becomes fit for this purpose English. … Since Indians wish to unite and develop a common culture it is the bounden duty of all Indians to own up Hindi as their language. Any Indian who does not accept this proposal as part and parcel of a linguistic State has no right to be an Indian. He … cannot be an Indian in the real sense of the word except in a geographical sense.”

This is more than wanting Hindi or Sanskrit. Ambedkar was saying that for real union among Indians, a common cultural base was necessary. He saw nation-hood not just in terms of territory or maps, but in terms of shared culture, language, and identity.

He Wanted an Army Without Elements Hostile to India

Dr. Ambedkar made a clear, harsh analysis of the army before Partition. He noticed that in the north-western region of India, there was a very high proportion of Islamists in the Indian Army. He challenged the British claim that Muslims in the North-West were “martial races” and Hindus elsewhere were not. Ambedkar said the real reason for this imbalance was not race or martial tradition but the rebellion of “1857 which was the real cause of the preponderance in the Indian Army of the men of the North-West”. He called the “martial and non-martial classes theory” “a purely arbitrary and artificial distinction”.

He also pointed out unfairness and fear that Hindus felt in that army. He wrote about the need for “getting rid of the Muslim preponderance in the Indian Army”.

He noted that “The bulk of this amount of Rs. 52 crores which is spent on the Army … is contributed by the Hindu Provinces and is spent on an Army which for the most part consists of non-Hindus! How many Hindus are aware of this tragedy? How many know at whose cost this tragedy is being enacted? Today the Hindus are not responsible for it because they cannot prevent it. The question is whether they will allow this tragedy to continue.”

Many people know Ambedkar’s views about complete exchange of populations as part of Partition. But far fewer know his thinking that Indian institutions, like the army, should be free from elements that are hostile to Indian national life.

He Was Suspicious of Missionary Support for Dalit Movements

Ambedkar wrote a preface to Prof Lakshmi Narasu’s book, the Essentials of Buddhism. In that, he warned that the support Christian missionaries gave to social reform was not purely out of kindness. Rather, he thought it was a way for them to lead people towards converting to Christianity. He said:

“That was the era when Christian Missionaries were not only countenancing the social reform movement but viewed it with high favour as marking a half-way house between orthodox Hinduism and conversion to Christianity. It did not take long for them to change their views and look upon such progressive movements as constituting a real hindrance to proselytization.”

There is also in Collected Works of Dr. Ambedkar (Vol-17) a letter from Babu Jagivan Ram, a leader of Scheduled Communities. The letter is from British CID files in Bihar, in a Special Officer’s report, dated 9 March 1937.

In the letter, Jagivan Ram begins with “my dear Doctor Saheb”. He warns Ambedkar about Mr Baldeo Prasad Jaiswal of Allahabad. He says, “No person of Bihar is with him. He has his office located in a Catholic Church here and everything is being manoeuvred by missionaries”. He then says “he will not be able to have a gathering of more than one hundred Depressed Classes”. But Jagivan Ram adds that “He can, of course, invite thousands of Muhammidans and Christians as he did at Lucknow. I take strong objection of this method. We should have genuine Depressed Classes conferences”, so the letter ends.

The letter shows that both Ambedkar and Jagivan Ram did not like missionary interference in Scheduled Communities’ movements. Also, the fact that the letter was in British CID files suggests that the colonial state was watching or interfering.

He Wanted the State to Run a Hindu Priest Service

In his seminal work Annihilation of Caste, Ambedkar proposed that the Indian government should form a body of Hindu priests similar to civil services. Under this scheme:

• Priesthood would “cease to be hereditary”.

• Every Hindu would be eligible to become a priest.

• The exam for Hindu priesthood, he believed, should be “prescribed by the State”.

• “No ceremony performed by a priest who does not hold a sanad shall be deemed to be valid in law, and it should be made penal [=punishable] for a person who has no sanad to officiate as a priest.”

He also stated that “the number of priests should be limited by law according to the requirements of the State, as is done in the case of the I.C.S.”

At first, some might think this is unjust: why should the state control religious offices? But Ambedkar saw this plan also as giving the state a sponsorship role for Hinduism. If such a Hindu Priest Service is free from corruption, keeps updating with changing times, it could be very useful for Hindus who care about reform and fairness.

Interestingly, this dream of Dr. Ambedkar may be realised through a most practical scheme of the Madhya Pradesh government.

Sources:

• Manuscripts/Collected Works of Ambedkar, Vol-17; Annihilation of Caste
• Ambedkar on mahavakyas and democracy, Riddles of Hinduism; speech to the Jat-Pat-Todak Mandal.
• Ambedkar’s Hindu Code Bill speech, 11 January 1950.
• Henry Vincent Hodson, The Great Divide: Britain-India-Pakistan (1969), account of 3 May 1948 meeting.
• Reports of his support for Sanskrit: The Sunday Hindustan Standard, the Constituent Assembly debates, comments by historians and later by Chief Justice Bobde.