Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati on Monday paid tributes to party founder Kanshi Ram on his death anniversary and said that the Dalit scion sacrificed everything to free the ‘Bahujan Samaj’ from the chains of slavery and help the community stand on their feet.
Mayawati said that the government should conduct a national-level census of OBCs to fill the backlogs to give rights to the OBCs even though women’s reservation was being trumpeted.
Mayawati called on the workers and leaders of the party to take the keys of power in their hands to fulfil Kanshi Ram’s dreams.
In a series of posts on X in Hindi, Mayawati said it was due to Kanshi Ram’s struggle that the BSP came to power in Uttar Pradesh four times. “… tributes to respected Kanshi Ram ji today on his death anniversary, (the one) who kept the self-respect movement of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar alive,” the BSP chief said.
“He sacrificed everything to bring the ‘Bahujan Samaj’ out of slavery. Due to his struggle, the BSP formed the government in Uttar Pradesh four times and a strong foundation of social change and economic liberation was laid,” she said.
“BSP people across the country remember the ‘Bahujan hero’ and the party will fulfil Kanshi Ram’s mission, for which the struggle continues,” she added.
Mayawati said that the extreme casteist and anti-reservation parties like BJP, Congress, etc are in a race these days to show themselves as new well-wishers of the downtrodden for the sake of votes before the next Lok Sabha elections.
“The contribution of Babasaheb and Kanshi Ram for the welfare of OBCs and religious minorities, a special part of the Bahujan society along with the Dalit tribal community, is not hidden from anyone. Who can forget the BSP’s long-term struggle to protest at Delhi Board Club, etc to implement the recommendations of the Mandal Commission and give 27 per cent reservation to the OBC community in education and government jobs,” she added.
Reiterating the demand, Mayawati said it could not be denied that there were people with anti-reservation and casteist thinking who continuously conspired to make the reservation of SC/ST community inactive and also did not clear the backlog of reservation for these classes.
“For this reason, people of the Bahujan community have no role in policy making. The deserving and needy do not get even the slightest benefit from the BJP’s much publicised development promises. On top of this, the biggest impact of the rising inflation, poverty, unemployment and poor basic needs like roads, electricity, water, education and health have to be borne by the poor people of Bahujan community and upper caste in every way. In these special matters of public welfare, the Congress and BJP governments have been the culprits,” Mayawati said.
“There is a need for the people of Bahujan community — SC/ST, OBC, religious minorities, etc to understand this and avoid falling for the false promises and conspiracies of these opposition parties. If we continue to rely on them, it is just like axing one’s own feet,” the UP ex-CM said.
Born in Punjab’s Rupnagar on March 15, 1934, Kanshi Ram worked for the uplift and political mobilisation of backward classes. He founded Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DS-4), All India Backwards (SC/ST/OBC) and Minorities Communities Employees’ Federation (BAMCEF) in 1971 and the BSP in 1984. He died on October 9, 2006, in Delhi.
Kanshi Ram was the Lok Sabha MP from Hoshiarpur in Punjab from 1996 to 1998, and from Etawah in Uttar Pradesh from 1991 to 1996. He was also a Rajya Sabha member from 1998 to 2004.
