16/08/2022
“Freedom of mind is the real freedom. A person whose mind is not free though he may not be in chains, is a slave, not a free man. One whose mind is not free, though he may not be in prison, is a prisoner and not a free man. One whose mind is not free though alive, is no better than dead. Freedom of mind is the proof of one’s existence.” --- Babasaheb Dr. BR Ambedkar
After reading this long quote by a great Indian, one may wonder why Ambedkar is saying paradoxical things. To be clear, what Dr. Ambedkar has said might be paradoxical in the way the quote is structured, but it is the reality that one might witness in present India, i.e., India@75. In today’s India, we the people of India aren’t truly free in the sense that though we have constitutional guarantees, we are still discriminated against and our liberties are curtailed. This is the point at which the imagined/ideal India of our constitutional framers and various freedom fighters fails. There is no doubt that India has achieved remarkable success in the last 75 years in certain sectors, but it is also not false that India, even after 75 years of independence, is still backward in many social, political, and economic aspects. Recently, a news flashed which reported that a nine-year-old Scheduled Caste child was brutally beaten up by his teacher in Rajasthan for drinking water from a pot. This incident took place on 20th July, 2022 and the victim had to be hospitalized. Unfortunately, the victim succumbed to the injuries inflicted by the casteist teacher on 14th August, 2022. This incident is one of many atrocities that the people of marginalised communities still face.
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“Freedom of mind is the real freedom. A person whose mind is not free though he may not be in chains, is a slave, not a free man. One whos...