Born into a caste treated as untouchable, Ambedkar studied at Columbia, where he was a student of John Dewey, and at the London School of Economics. Back in India he became a lawyer, scholar and leader of the oppressed castes, and chaired the committee that drafted the Indian Constitution. Shortly before his death he converted to Buddhism with hundreds of thousands of followers.
Core ideas
Caste is a system of graded inequality that must be destroyed, not reformed
Political democracy cannot survive without social and economic democracy
Religion should be judged by reason and by how it treats the least powerful
The tradition: Anti-caste reformer
The anti-caste movement fights the hereditary hierarchy that has ranked people in South Asia by birth. Ambedkar is its towering figure, joining philosophy, law and mass politics.
