1923: Dr. Ambedkar returned to India, after studying abroad, and continued his fight on behalf of the "Untouchables". The movement for Independence from the British in India was growing, and Gandhi had started advocating a policy of non-cooperation with the Government, and had launched the first of his campaigns of mass civil disobedience.

The 1920's, 1930's and 1940's in India: 

Challenge to SWARAJ: Self-Help Movement and Political Independence from the British

Gandhi and The Congress Party, SATYAGRAHA, utilized non-violent protests.

Ambedkar supported the movement for national independence, but for him it was THE CASTE SYSTEM that crippled India, not the British. 

Gandhi and the Congress Party believed that the caste system, purged of "untouchability", should remain the social backbone of India.

 1927-1935: Ambedkar's non-violent campaigns worked within the system; a series of sit-ins, demonstrations, and negotiations with Hindu leaders to assert the right of the "Untouchables" to enter Hindu places of worship, to draw water from public tanks and wells, and to have rights in the courts.

1932: Chowdar Failure of a mass demonstration for access to the water supply. Protesters drank from the tanks and Caste Hindus claimed they had to “purify the tank with cow dung and urine.” Ambedkar declared that Hinduism itself had become the fighting issue.

 1935: "Most Daring Speech" Dramatic Expression at Depressed Classes Conference that though he had been born a Hindu he did not intend to die one. Urged leaders of Depressed Classes to CONSIDER RELIGIOUS IDENTITY A CHOICE, NOT A FACT OF DESTINY.

"If you want to gain self-respect, change your religion. 

 If you want to create a cooperating society, change your religion. 

If you want power, change your religion. 

If you want equality, change your religion. 

If you want independence, change your religion.

If you want to make the world in which you live happy, change your religion.

This speech sparked years of debate. Upon hearing Ambedkar’s speech Gandhi himself remarked that: “Religion is not like a house or a cloak, which can be changed at will. It is a more integral part of one’s body.”

Ambedkar's wife Ramabai died.

Elected to Bombay Legislative Assembly

1942: “My final word of advice to you is educate, agitate, and organize. Have faith in yourself. With justice on our side, I do not see how we can lose our battle. The battle to me is a matter of joy. The battle is in the fullest sense spiritual. There is nothing material or social in it. For ours is a battle not for wealth or for power. It is a battle for freedom. It is a battle for the reclamation of the human personality.”  (from a speech made at the All-India Depressed Classes Conference)

1944: Ambedkar argued that Buddhist philosophy, like contemporary science, is based on experience and reason, unlike the scriptural fundamentalism of the Brahmins.  

1947: Indian Independence Ambedkar appointed First Law Minister in Nehru's Cabinet, then The Chairman of Drafting Committee for the Indian Constitution. 

In these positions he placed the ancient Buddhist image of the roaring lions, symbolizing the conquest of law, on the Indian currency, and the traditional Buddhist Dharma Wheel, representing interdependence and liberation, on the Indian flag.

Dr. Ambedkar's opinion was:

that only political independence would bring social equality within the reach of the Depressed classes,

that no class was good enough to rule over another class,

that Caste Hindus were not good enough to lord over the Depressed classes.

These views eventually brought him into open conflict with Mahatma Gandhi and The Congress Party.

1948: Gandhi was assassinated.

Draft Constitution was completed, Ambedkar as Chairman of Drafting Committee for the Indian Constitution.

1949: New Constitution was adopted. Clause 47 of the Constitution abolished untouchability, but still they continued to suffer at the hands of the Caste Hindus, many of the disabilities imposed in accordance with the Hindu scriptures.

1951: Hindu Code Bill Dr. Ambedkar spent many years trying to work within the Hindu system. His Hindu Code Bill, which he tried to pilot through the Indian parliament in 1951, was to have been an instrument of radical reform, reviewing and changing laws relating to the personal life of the entire Hindu population.

 Ambedkar was accused of trying to destroy Hinduism, and yet Dr Ambedkar eschewed violence ,despite bitter frustrations and opposition, and insisted that the struggle for rights be carried out within the law. He had high hopes that independence would bring the liberty, equality, fraternity and justice that he saw as the basis for an ideal society. 

Those hopes faded as he saw the continuing political and social dominance  of the 'higher' castes and their refusal to make significant changes in the structure of society. A key moment for him was the failure of a Bill he had, as Law Minister, introduced into Parliament to give women equal property rights.

"Ambedkar's efforts met with outrage and abuse: he was accused of trying to break up orthodox Hindu society. He was. Although deeply attached to the Hindu religion himself, he was also acquainted with the principles of Western democratic idealism - liberty, fraternity, equality, and recognised that something was wrong, that there was something rotten in orthodox Hindu society: the inhuman conditions imposed upon members of the Untouchable castes. With his Bill watered down and compromised, his indignation with the cruel treatment of so many human beings still intact, he began to realise that mere legal reform was never going to provide a final answer. It was going to take some complete break with the whole system. Question: How do you stop men treating other men as Untouchable? Answer: Take the Untouchable man out of the system that designates him as Untouchable, and place him within one where no such categories exist. Dr Ambedkar intensified his study of the major world religions: Christianity, Sikhism, Islam, and Buddhism." ("The Birth of a Movement" by Nagabodhi on Dr. Ambedkar and Bhante in India.)

1951: Ambedkar resigned from Cabinet, tired and disgusted.

1953: Began quest for religious conversion.

1955: Founded Bharatiya Bauddha Mahasabha.

 

Sources: Ambedkar and Buddhism” by Sangharakshita pages pages 3 to 14, and page 35, published by Windhorse, 1986; Christopher Queen’s article “The Great Conversion: Dr. Ambedkar and the Buddhist Revival in India" pages 64 & 67 Tricycle magazine, Spring 1993; "The Birth of a Movement" by Nagabodhi on Dr. Ambedkar and Bhante in India.