The reverence Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar commands years after his death shows through in this documentary film, which has been compiled from YouTube clips of rare pictures and speeches. It is an unconventional documentary, but it is an act of dedication that echoes even today.
While Independence Day is associated with Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, the honour of Republic Day goes to Ambedkar, the architect of the Indian constitution.
Once you have finished watching the documentary, listen to Ambedkar sum up the Constituent Assembly’s work and present the constitution to parliament. Everyone has already heard Nehru’s speech on the night of August 14, 1947. Ambedkar’s similarly iconic speech is marked by a deep understanding of both academic and social reality.
“On the 26th of January 1950, we are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality. In politics we will be recognising the principle of one man one vote and one vote one value,” he said. “In our social and economic life, we shall, by reason of our social and economic structure, continue to deny the principle of one man one value. [...] We must remove this contradiction at the earliest possible moment or else those who suffer from inequality will blow up the structure of political democracy which is Assembly has to laboriously built up.”