For Ambedkar body chief, Yogi is ‘Dalit Dev’
LUCKNOW: Chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Thursday said that while all others had been doing politics in the name of Dr BR Ambedkar, it was the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led governments that ensured that all the top five places associated with him are converted into ‘PanchTeerth (five pilgrimages).
“We corrected the way his name was spelt in Uttar Pradesh,” said Adityanath, while speaking at a function organised to mark the 63rd Mahaparinirvaan Diwas (death anniversary) of Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar, the architect of the Indian Constitution.
The Ambedkar Mahasabha, which had bestowed ‘Dalit Mitra’ title to Adityanath on the birth anniversary of Ambedkar in April this year, on Thursday referred to him as ‘Dalit Dev’.
“He is not just Dalit Mitra (a friend of Dalits) but also the Dalit Dev (a god for Dalits),” said Dr Lalji Prasad Nirmal, chairman, Ambedkar Mahasabha, an influential Dalit organisation in UP.
The state government, in April this year, had appointed Nirmal as the chairperson of the UP Scheduled Castes Finance and Development Corporation.
Adityanath said the top five places that the BJP government has linked up and developed as ‘Panch Teerth’ are Ambedkar’s birthplace in Madhya Pradesh, where he lived in London, where he took Deeksha in Nagpur and a place each in Mumbai and Delhi. He said the Narendra Modi government has also worked towards providing houses, electricity connections and cooking gas to the deprived. It provided toilets to 12 crore people who lived without toilets and made provisions for easy loans.
Nirmal praised Adityanath for correcting Ambedkar’s name and passing the order that all government offices should have Ambedkar’s portrait.
He also demanded an Ambedkar Memorial at the place where UP Haj Committee was situated. The area is now vacant as Haj House has shifted to another place.
Adityanath said that a committee will look into the safety and development of the place.
Chief guest governor Ram Naik said: “I have already completed four years and four months of my five-year term. I had the good fortune of coming to this place (Ambedkar Mahasabha) each year. And also that among those visits I also accompanied Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Ram Nath Kovind.”
Naik also reminded how he took up the name correction idea which the government duly executed. “I gave the proof that Dr Ambedkar had signed his name on the Constitution document as Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar.