Who is my own? The kuleen Brahmans or Babasaheb Ambedkar?

 The reservations have again raised a question in my mind. Modi sarkar has seen the coming of feminism in India to a growing extent and it is destined to grow with the growth of Hindutva. But my question is, what is feminism these days? Is giving reservations to women a part of the feminist mindset? No, it is not. 

I want to speak up against this system of reservations. Gandhiji and Ambedkar entered into an agreement that History books call the 'Poona Pact'. Bapu did not want the country to split up along the lines of caste, he wanted the casteism to go away. Babasaheb was bitter and angry and wanted to do something for the Harijans. Now the term 'Harijan' itself has been given by Gandhiji which touches my heart because Sri Hari Himself is my Ishtha and my love. So, yes, the people being called 'Harijans' does appeal to me but why didn't he call us, the women 'Harijans' too? 

If the Harijans have faced atrocities without any reason then so have we. These superstitious people have stripped our dignity away and by we, I do not mean all the women. By 'we', I mean the women born to the Brahmins and the Kshatriyas. Babasaheb, you were lucky that you could at least hate the people who committed countless and unforgivable atrocities on you, but had I been born during those times, would I have been able to hate the people you hated too? 

Men give birth to women, Babasaheb, and women give birth to men. The entire cycle of life is such that if anyone has ever survived to reach adulthood then it is only because of karuna, and 'karuna' is the most favourite word of my favourite, the great Dalai Lama of Tibet who has always ruled over my heart as a Sannyasi, something that I would like to be forever. Did you show karuna, Babasaheb? Because if you would then why didn't you do anything for us ever? 

You were mad at those evil superstitious demons defiling our gerua, the saffron of dharma. But they didn't spare their women, Babasaheb. You know, you must have known, that the Manusmriti that you had burnt was a narak of paap, the paap, the vile demonic nature which insults my Sri Hari. The sin that Satan represents, the same sin which kept the Brahmin and Kshatriya women as nothing more that just mothers and sisters. 

Now, there is nothing wrong with being a mother if it means mother's tender love. There is nothing wrong with being a sister if it means the tenderness and happiness of a sister's companionship. I say that because Mother Teresa was 'mother' too and Bhagini Nivedita was a Bhagini or sister too. But, mother is not a machine that accepts seeds for a man to give birth of sons to continue the lineage. For what is the use of a lineage that is based on hatred? We all know, Babasaheb, that love is the giver and the source of life. Hatred takes life away. Then why has a mother not been respected for her loving heart and rather for her fertile womb in your times, Babasaheb? And even more so, in the families of the devil insulting our pavitra-holy-paavan gerua?

And then there are the sisters, Babasaheb, who were nothing more than burdens on their families for the dowries and instruments of social negotiation. We have heard stories of how big brothers have worked hard just to get their sisters married. But, Babasaheb, the saviour of the crushed and despised, why then has there been such a rush to get rid of a sister? Is it not common knowledge that a man who will not marry a woman without a hefty dowry is incapable of love and undeserving of the woman? Are all men the same Babasaheb? Are all of them undeserving of love that instead of stopping such marriages and trying and saving their sisters from such a doomed husband, men work with all their might to get their sisters doomed?

And then there are the juvenile boys, minor boys, not unheard of even in modern day Haryana, who happily kill their didi, just because she wants to marry whom she loves. These all boys, these all men belong to the same group which dared despise you and you hated them back rightfully. If such is the situation now, Babasaheb, then what was the situation back in your days? Babasaheb, how could it all, how could we all, be invisible to your eyes? Babasaheb, being a man, you can attack and wage war against a man but not woman. I think you knew this being as educated as you were, so you chose to ignore us, to you, we did not exist. 

Were you in a dilemma, Babasaheb? Were you in a dilemma about whether to work for us or not when we were the ones ill-treating you too? But, Babasaheb, even if my female ancestors did hurt you, they were no different from the Harijan being forced to keep even his shadow away from a certain group which called itself superior. Atleast, Babasaheb, you have seen love in your family, my ancestors have not. For why would anyone treat his daughter, sister, or mother this way if they loved her? Even now, it is the 'upper castes' who kills their daughters when they are born, your ancestors would never have done that. Didn't your sister have a better life than my own great great grandmother? Then can you still hate us, Babasaheb? We were born in hatred, brought up in hatred for no 'upper caste' wants a daughter and we died neglect. Our bodies still breathed to give birth to hatred for it is never a mother who wants her daughter dead, it is the father, it is everyone else, but not the mother. 

Imagine the predicament of a mother, Babasaheb, who has to carry out nine months of pregnancy then give birth to her precious child, a daughter, a part of her own heart, and watch her being killed. What violence can be greater than that? And these cycles of hatred repeated itself and she accepted the death of her own soul. Her body lived on for it did not know what else to do and awaited itself to get old, reach menopause, and be discarded long before it gets to embrace the funeral pyre. Even then, it is a man who burns her remains for it is the same man who has tormented you. 

Babasaheb, a woman who had to live this life cannot be judged. She did illtreat you, she did stop you from drinking from her public wells, she did throw food at you without another look. But what you saw was her body that outlived her soul. What did you do to save her, Babasaheb? Nothing?

And such is the predicament of mine that I am angry with the kuleen Brahmans beyond the limit anyone could ever have been. But even their staunchest opponent, Babasaheb Ambedkar, had failed me. I keep wondering where I am in History. Then I realize that I rarely ever lived and breathed with a soul, for if my soul were to live then my body would die, unable to take all this hatred, my body would die and my soul would live, which means I again died.

I was reading the Upanishads, the Gita, the Bhagwatam. And, reading the Sanskrit, there is no hatred, there is only love. Yet, the translations and interpretations done by people who had lived those days are downright sinful. Sri Hari is the greatest in my life, Srimad Bhagvatam is my Sri Hari in the form of a book. I want to ask these Sanskrit scholars and sadhus which I dare them to answer. How dare you insult him this way? How dare you interpret it in your hateful way? How dare you try to tarnish the image of the God of Love in my eyes? How dare to touch him, his form of a book, Bhagvatam? How dare you say anything about his words, the Gita? I dare you to come and fight me for I cannot let this happen, For the love of Sri Hari, I cannot let this happen, for I will not hear a word against my own true love. 

But the Poona pact did bring forth the issue of reservations. I don't want us to get any reservations because I don't want our self confidence to break. When I go for IBPS exams, for instance, I look around and I know that I am no less capable and worthy than anyone else around here who has showed up for Mains or Interviews. I know that there are people around me who have availed an education as good as my own, have had a childhood maybe better than my own, maybe their families are far wealthier than me, yet they have managed to show up till here only because of reservation. Yes, I get a degree of rightful anger too but that inflates my confidence. I thank my stars that I was born into the General category so whatever I will end up doing will be just out of my own hard work and ability. I do not need reservations to give me a job or anything at all, I am no less deserving that anyone else. 

Please don't give me any reservations ever, it is the one thing that makes me so proud to be born as a woman, please, please, netas and babus, do not take that away from me. For after such a long time, I do have self-respect, do not sacrifice it at the altar of your political ambitions. Please! For if you do it, you are as bad as those fathers who gave birth to me out of pure hatred for my mothers and those sons who happily cleared the debris off my burning my mortal remains in the pyre. 

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