Ambedkar Jayanti 2024: Date and History
The Ambedkar Jayanti is celebration with great enthusiasm around the country on April 14 annually. He was born on April 14, 1891 at Mhow near Indore in the then Central Province, now Madhya Pradesh. For the first time, activist Janardan Sadashiv Ranapisay celebrated Ambedkar’s birthday publicly on 14 April 1928 in Pune. Since then, this day is celebrated as Ambedkar Jayanti or Bhim Jayanti. From a humble origin, Dr Ambedkar went on to become one of the foremost legal minds in the country. On March 31, 20211 , the Government of India decided to declare April 14 as a public holiday on account of the birthday of Dr BR Ambedkar.
Ambedkar Jayanti 2024: Significance
After returning to India from his studies abroad, Bhimrao Ambedkar observed that caste discrimination was almost fragmenting the Nation. For the upliftment of the downtrodden, Ambedkar provided reservations for Dalits and other religious communities.
In 1923, he set up the ‘Bahishkrit Hitkarini Sabha (Outcastes Welfare Association), for spreading education and culture amongst the downtrodden, improving the economic status and raising matters concerning their problems in the proper forums to focus attention on them and finding solutions to the same.
In 1927, he led the Mahad March at the Chowdar Tank. This marked the beginning of the anti-caste and anti-priest movement. The temple entry movement launched by Dr. Ambedkar in 1930 at Kalaram temple, Nasik is another landmark in the struggle for human rights and social justice.
Dr. Ambedkar attended all the three Round Table Conferences in London and each time, emphatically projected his views in the interests of the ‘untouchable’. He exhorted the downtrodden sections to raise their living standards and to acquire as much political power as possible.
