BABG-171 Solved Question Paper

Question 1

Rewritten question: How does the Indian Constitution provide special safeguards for historically disadvantaged communities?

Background to special safeguards

Dr B. R. Ambedkar had seen from his own life how the Depressed Classes were denied education, jobs, dignity and basic rights. He was convinced that political speeches were not enough; real protection had to be written into the Constitution itself so that any government would be bound to respect these rights.

Fundamental Rights that protect disadvantaged groups

Some Fundamental Rights are meant for all citizens but are particularly important for Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs) and other backward communities:​

• Equality before law and equal protection of laws ensure that a Dalit, Adivasi or any member of a backward class has the same legal status as any other citizen.
• Prohibition of discrimination on the grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth directly attacks traditional practices of exclusion in schools, jobs and public places.
• Equality of opportunity in public employment aims to open government jobs to all, not just to traditionally privileged castes.
• Abolition of untouchability declares all practices of treating some people as “untouchable” to be illegal and punishable.
• Prohibition of traffic in human beings and forced labour protects the poor from being pushed into bonded labour and other degrading work.

In real life this means, for example, that a student from a formerly “untouchable” community can demand admission to a government college without being refused simply because of caste, and can challenge such discrimination in court.

Special constitutional provisions for certain classes

In addition to general rights, the Constitution contains a separate cluster of provisions (in Part XVI) that give focused protection and opportunities to certain sections: SCs, STs, Anglo-Indians and socially and educationally backward classes.

• Political representation: Seats are reserved for SCs and STs in the Lok Sabha and in the Legislative Assemblies of the States so that these communities can send their own representatives to law-making bodies and speak about their problems directly.
• Anglo-Indian community: Where necessary, a limited number of members of this small minority can be nominated to the Lok Sabha and to State Assemblies to ensure their voice is not lost.
• Time-bound reservations: The original Constitution fixed a time limit for such special political reservations, with the idea that they are remedies to correct historic injustice, not permanent separations.
• Claims in public services: While maintaining efficiency of administration, the Constitution directs that the claims of SCs and STs must be taken into account in appointments to Union and State services.
• Commissions and Special Officer: A Special Officer and later commissions are to investigate how safeguards for SCs, STs and other backward classes are working and to recommend improvements.

Practical importance in everyday life

Because of these provisions, a girl from a remote Dalit hamlet can today sit in a reserved constituency and see someone from her community speak in Parliament; she can compete for reserved seats in educational institutions and government jobs; and she knows that there is a constitutional body where complaints about discrimination can be taken up. In this way Ambedkar’s insistence on constitutional safeguards turns into concrete support for ordinary people struggling against centuries of exclusion.

Question 2

Rewritten question: How did Ambedkar understand state socialism, and what were the main features of his proposal?

Why Ambedkar was dissatisfied with existing economic systems

Ambedkar carefully studied capitalism, socialism and mixed economy. He felt that capitalism, with private ownership and profit as the main goal, concentrates wealth in a few hands and allows the rich to dominate the poor. On the other hand, a rigid socialist system in which the state owns everything may become totalitarian and suppress individual freedom. He therefore searched for an alternative that could combine economic justice with political democracy.

Basic idea of state socialism

Ambedkar’s state socialism aimed to reduce inequality and exploitation while retaining parliamentary democracy. He wanted the Constitution itself to lay down the economic structure so that future governments could not easily reverse it. In his view, only a constitutional guarantee could ensure three objectives together: to establish equality (socialism), to preserve liberty (parliamentary democracy), and to avoid dictatorship.

Key features of Ambedkar’s scheme

In his memorandum to the Constituent Assembly he outlined a detailed plan:

• Agriculture as a state industry: Land would be owned by the state. Agricultural land held by private owners, tenants or mortgagees would be acquired with compensation.
• Standard farms and tenants: The acquired land would be reorganised into farms of standard size and leased out to village residents as tenants, without discrimination on caste or creed.
• State ownership of key industries: Core and basic industries would be owned and operated by the state, so that private monopolies could not control vital resources.
• Compulsory life insurance: Every adult citizen would be covered by compulsory life insurance run by the state, giving families some protection against sudden loss of income.
• Space for private activity: While key sectors would be in state hands, other economic activities could remain with private individuals or enterprises.

For a student of economics, this model shows a mixed picture: the state actively manages land and basic industries for social justice, while still leaving scope for private initiative.

Relevance for ordinary people

Ambedkar’s concern was very practical. He had seen landless labourers thrown out by landlords and workers dismissed when big investors withdrew. Under his scheme, a landless family could get secure tenancy on a standard farm, and a worker in a key industry would not be at the mercy of a few private owners. Even today, debates on public sector, welfare schemes and regulation of big corporations echo many of his ideas on state socialism.

Question 3

Rewritten question: How did Ambedkar assess the way colonial India contributed to the economic growth of England?

Pre-colonial prosperity and early England

Ambedkar first compared pre-colonial India with England before it became a major trading power. Drawing on historians, he pointed out that regions like Bengal were known for rich agriculture and flourishing crafts, whereas England in earlier centuries had a much weaker economy. This contrast helped him to show that India’s later poverty was not natural; it was connected to colonial rule.

Rise of English wealth after 1600

He noted that from the seventeenth century onwards, merchants in England became very powerful. Trade expanded rapidly and there were many more wealthy traders than before. Taxes collected in England increased several times as commerce grew. Ambedkar linked this transformation to the expansion of the East India Company’s activities in India, including trade in Indian goods and later direct control over territory.

Mechanisms of economic drain from India

Ambedkar carefully examined colonial policies and showed several ways in which India’s resources supported England’s development:

• Destruction of Indian industry: British manufactured goods, especially textiles, were given preference. Indian cloth producers were undercut and many artisans in centres like Surat and Bengal lost their livelihood.
• Heavy land revenue: Land taxes in India were much higher than in England and often uncertain. Peasants had to pay a large share of their produce as tax, leaving little for their own survival or investment.
• Tribute and remittances: Surplus revenue from India was not reinvested here but sent to England as tribute, dividends to company shareholders and payments for “home charges”. This created a continuous drain of wealth.
• Public debt pattern: Ambedkar showed that Indian debt shot up dramatically between the late eighteenth and mid-nineteenth centuries, while the company’s debt raised in England remained relatively limited. Much of this Indian debt was linked to wars and administrative expenses that served British interests.
• Skewed expenditure: A very high proportion of government spending in India went to the army, while expenditure on public works and welfare was minimal, unlike in English cities where local bodies invested heavily in services like water supply.

Consequences for India and benefits for England

In simple terms, Ambedkar argued that India was made to pay for England’s prosperity. The colonial government extracted land revenue, customs, salt tax and other duties from a largely poor population and used a significant part of that wealth for British interests.

For example, a small cotton weaver in a town like Surat would see cheap British cloth flooding the market. As his sales declined, he might be forced to abandon his craft and work as an agricultural labourer, at the same time that high land taxes and war-related expenditure continued. England, meanwhile, gained from Indian raw materials, markets and payments. Through this detailed economic analysis, Ambedkar concluded that colonial rule systematically enriched England while impoverishing India.

Question 4

Rewritten question: Why is Ambedkar’s philosophy on land taxation, land reforms and land holdings still important?

Problems in the agrarian structure

At the time of independence, most Indians depended on agriculture, yet land was very unequally distributed. A large portion of cultivable land was in the hands of big landlords, while many actual cultivators were tenants, sharecroppers or landless labourers. Holdings were often tiny and fragmented, and colonial land revenue policies put a heavy burden on small farmers. Ambedkar studied these conditions closely and proposed a comprehensive approach.

Ambedkar’s ideas on land taxation

He argued that land tax should follow the principle of “ability to pay”. This meant that:​

• Land revenue should be progressive – those earning more from agriculture should pay a higher rate.
• Small and uneconomic holdings should either pay very little or be exempted from tax so that poor peasants are not pushed into debt.
• Arrears of rent owed by poor tenants should be remitted, especially when revenue arrears had already been waived.

For a small farmer this approach is very meaningful: instead of facing the same tax rate as a large landlord, he would get relief during bad years and have a better chance to invest in seeds, irrigation or education of children.

Land reforms and small holdings

Ambedkar treated agriculture as a form of industry and stressed that production could not increase without major changes in the pattern of holdings and cultivation. He emphasised:

• Abolition of intermediaries who collected rent but did not cultivate.
• Creation of economic holdings through land ceilings and redistribution of surplus land to landless and small farmers.
• Modernisation of rural economy so that agriculture and industry grow together and excess labour can find non-farm work.

Co-operative cultivation and nationalisation of land

To overcome the disadvantages of very small plots, he supported co-operative farming. Owners of small strips within a standard area would cultivate jointly while retaining their private ownership. He also favoured nationalisation of land, with the state as the principal owner and cultivators as tenants of the state, so that landlordism could be abolished and rational planning of agriculture would become possible.

Continuing relevance

Post-independence land reforms, land ceilings and redistribution policies were influenced by several of these ideas, though their implementation varied greatly across states. Where reforms were weak, tenants and small farmers continued to struggle and movements like Tebhaga in Bengal emerged. Even today, reports of farmer suicides and rural distress show that unresolved issues of land, credit and taxation remain.

For a young student from a farming family, Ambedkar’s philosophy makes sense in very concrete terms: fair land tax, secure rights over the field actually cultivated, and possibilities of co-operative work can together reduce the constant fear of eviction and indebtedness, and open the way for a more dignified rural life.

Question 5

Rewritten question: How did Ambedkar view Hindu society and its social order?

Hindu society as a “myth”

Ambedkar argued that what is commonly called “Hindu society” is not a unified society at all but a loose collection of castes. The term “Hindu”, he pointed out, was originally a name used by outsiders and does not indicate an inner unity. In his view, each caste is mainly concerned with its own survival and status; a broad feeling of togetherness appears only during Hindu–Muslim conflicts, not in everyday life.

Caste as division of labourers, not just division of labour

While some defenders of the caste system claimed that it simply provides a useful division of labour, Ambedkar insisted that it actually divides the labourers themselves into rigid compartments:

• It creates a hierarchy, where some castes are placed above others and enjoy more rights and respect.
• Occupations are fixed by birth, not by individual aptitude or training, so a person cannot freely choose or change his or her work.
• Restrictions on movement between occupations and castes lead to widespread unemployment and underemployment.
• In many cases, people prefer to remain poor rather than take up work considered “low” for their caste.

Impact on social unity and ethics

Ambedkar maintained that a real society needs common activity and shared emotions. Caste prevents people from cooperating freely and sharing a common life. It limits communication across caste boundaries and thus blocks the development of a unified social consciousness or national feeling.

Ethically too, the caste system has serious effects. It teaches people to value ritual purity more than human equality, and to accept discrimination as normal. Untouchability, in particular, is for Ambedkar not only a religious practice but also an economic system worse than slavery, because it denies a whole group access to most sources of livelihood and dignity.

Everyday experience and Ambedkar’s critique

For instance, when a bright student from an “untouchable” community is discouraged from sitting with others in a village classroom or is asked to use a separate utensil in a tea stall, this is not a small “custom”; it reflects a deep structure in which people are judged by birth. Ambedkar’s writings gave such experiences a clear language and argued that a society built on graded inequality cannot claim to be moral or modern.

Question 6

Rewritten question: How did Ambedkar struggle for social justice during the British period?

Personal experience and public mission

Ambedkar was born into an untouchable community and faced humiliating discrimination from childhood – in school, public spaces and social life. This background gave him a strong commitment to fight for the rights of the Depressed Classes through organised action and constitutional means.

Demands before commissions and committees

One major step was his detailed statement to the Simon Commission in 1928 where he demanded safeguards for the Depressed Classes in the Bombay Presidency. He argued that representation must be linked to population and social status and insisted that the government should spread education, end discrimination in recruitment and provide adequate safeguards.

As a member of the Bombay State Committee (1928–1930), he helped to prepare recommendations for the educational, economic and social uplift of the Depressed Classes and Aboriginal Tribes. The Committee suggested scholarships, hostels, recruitment in police and army, housing schemes, and legal measures against practices like dedication of devadasis and social boycotts.

Role in Round Table Conferences

During the Round Table Conferences in London (1930–32), Ambedkar brought the problems of the Depressed Classes to international attention. He pressed for:

• Separate electorates for the Depressed Classes, so they could elect their own representatives rather than depend on upper-caste leaders.
• Representation in provincial and central legislatures in proportion to their population.
• Opening up of military and police recruitment, and reservation of jobs in state and central services.
• Representation in all democratic bodies of the country and, where needed, separate settlements to provide security.

From agitation to constitutional safeguards

Ambedkar believed that mere promises would not protect the Depressed Classes. He therefore worked tirelessly to convert these demands into constitutional guarantees. The list of his central objectives during the British period included: full educational facilities, reserved jobs in public services, political representation at all levels, and special electoral arrangements so that the Depressed Classes could send their own leaders to legislatures.

For an ordinary person from a marginalised community, these efforts meant new possibilities: a hostel in town, a scholarship, a chance to join the police or postal department, and the feeling that “someone like us” can sit in council and speak on our behalf. Ambedkar’s struggle in the British period thus laid the foundation for the social justice provisions that were later written into the Constitution of independent India.

Question 7

Rewritten question: What was Ambedkar’s idea of a nation, and how did he apply it to India?

Concept of a nation

In the study material, a nation is described as a cultural–political community that becomes conscious of its autonomy, unity and specific interests. It usually shares certain features such as language, customs, habits and traditions, but more importantly it develops a sense of common life and destiny.

Is India a nation?

Ambedkar did not accept that India was already a full nation; he preferred to call it a “nation in the making”. He noted that colonial rulers often claimed that India was just a geographical expression with many peoples and languages, not a single nation. Ambedkar partly agreed, but for a different reason: he argued that internal divisions – especially caste and the lack of fraternity between communities – prevented India from becoming a true nation.

According to him, India could not be a nation as long as millions of ex-untouchables, backward castes and women were denied equal rights and dignity. He drew attention to the absence of fraternity between Hindus and Muslims and to the deep separation between upper castes and the Depressed Classes.

Ambedkar’s scheme of nation-building

Ambedkar proposed a different path to nation-building, centred on justice and equal citizenship:

• Establishing rights for the excluded: He argued that a nation can be built only when the rights of all groups, especially those historically excluded, are fully recognised and protected.
• Self-representation: Dalits, other backward castes, minorities and women must be able to represent themselves in political bodies instead of depending entirely on others to speak for them.
• Social and economic democracy: Political democracy (elections, parliaments) must be supported by social and economic democracy – that is, by equality in social status and fair distribution of resources.

Five-fold path for the future of the Indian nation

The unit summarises Ambedkar’s advice as a five-fold path to keep the Indian nation safe and united:​

• self-introspection by Indians;
• strict adherence to constitutional methods;
• rejection of hero-worship in politics;
• establishing social and economic democracy alongside political democracy;
• transforming “government by the people” into genuine “government for the people”.

In practical terms, when a university or panchayat ensures representation of SCs, STs, OBCs, minorities and women, and follows constitutional procedures instead of relying on a single “strong leader”, it is moving closer to Ambedkar’s idea of an Indian nation built on equality, fraternity and shared responsibility.

Question 8

Rewritten question: What are the main ways suggested by Ambedkar for building an ideal society?

Ambedkar’s vision of an ideal society

Ambedkar’s notion of an ideal society is closely connected with his social philosophy based on liberty, equality and fraternity. He traced these values to the teachings of the Buddha and saw them as the foundation of a new, egalitarian social order that could replace the caste-ridden Hindu social structure.

Key characteristics of the ideal society

In his writings he describes an ideal society in the following way:

• It should be mobile, with many open channels for change and communication between different groups.
• There should be many interests consciously shared, so that people participate together in common activities rather than living in isolated compartments.
• There must be varied and free points of contact between different associations – what he calls “social endosmosis”, meaning free mingling and flow of ideas and feelings across groups.
• It must be a democratic form of society where people respect each other as equals and rigid social barriers are removed.

Three principles guiding the ideal society

Ambedkar identifies three broad principles which together indicate the way to an ideal or just society:

• The individual as an end: Every person is an end in himself or herself. Society exists to help individuals grow and develop their personality; any demand for obedience to society must be justified as serving this purpose.
• Associated life based on liberty, equality, fraternity: Relations between members of society must be guided by these three values. No group should have permanent privileges or permanent disabilities.
• Democratic restructuring of power: Political power, which for long had been the monopoly of a few, must be redistributed so that the down-trodden can also participate in governing. Equality and fraternity in all spheres are necessary to prevent class war and to make self-realisation possible for the oppressed.

From caste society to just society

For Ambedkar, an ideal society is essentially a casteless society. The Hindu social order, with its fixed hierarchies and exclusion, has to be replaced by a social order where people meet as fellow citizens, not as members of graded castes. This means annihilation of caste and building institutions that reflect liberty, equality and fraternity in everyday life.

We can visualise this through a simple campus example: in an ideal college based on Ambedkar’s principles, students from different castes, communities and regions freely form study circles and friendships; hostels are not informally segregated; student unions and committees include representation from all sections; and respect for each person’s dignity is taken for granted. Such concrete practices give life to the philosophical principles of an ideal society that Ambedkar placed at the centre of his thought.