Kanshi Ram

 ( Dalit Politicians ) 

Kanshi Ram (15 March 1934 – 9 October 2006), also known as Bahujan Nayak or Manyavar, Sahab Kanshiram was an Indian politician and social reformer who worked for the upliftment and political mobilisation of the , the untouchability at the bottom of the caste system in India. Towards this end, Kanshi Ram founded Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DS-4), the All India Backwards (SC/ST/OBC) and Minorities Communities Employees' Federation (BAMCEF) in 1971 and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in 1984. He ceded leadership of the BSP to his protégé Mayawati who has served four terms as Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh.

After studies at various local schools, Ram graduated in 1956 with a BSc degree from Government College Ropar.

Later, in 1981, Ram formed another social organisation known as Dalit Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samiti (DSSSS, or DS4). He started his attempt of consolidating the Dalit vote and in 1984 he founded the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). He fought his first election in 1984 from Janjgir-Champa seat in Chhattisgarh. The BSP found success in Uttar Pradesh, initially struggled to bridge the divide between Dalits and Other Backward Classes but later under leadership of Mayawati bridged this gap.

In 1982, he published his only book The Chamcha Age, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Poona Pact. He dedicated the book to Jyotirao Phule, B. R. Ambedkar, Periyar, and ‘many other rebellious spirits’ who worked for Dalit emancipation. In the Poona Pact, Ambedkar who had worked hard to earn separate electorates from the British, had to surrender the possibility due to Mahatma Gandhi Gandhi's fast unto death. Ambedkar feared the possible consequences to the nascent Dalit movement if he had not. Ram believed that the separate electorates would have provided the Dalits autonomy and authority; it would have undermined the power of the upper castes who constituted a relatively smaller population. Ram argued that Gandhi manipulated Ambedkar into signing the pact, and implied a defeat for the Dalits. This directly led to The Chamcha (stooge) Age, where Dalit leaders were made stooges of the upper caste. Dalit electorates had little say in getting their representatives elected even in seats reserved for them. Ram used the term to describe Dalit leaders such as Jagjivan Ram and Ram Vilas Paswan. He argued that Dalits should work politically for their own ends rather than compromise by working with other parties. Opportunist mobilization of a section of Dalits in the chamcha age thus produces, what Kanshi Ram calls, an ‘alienation of the elite’. The Dalit elite could overcome this alienation by ‘payback to the oppressed and exploited society’.

After forming BSP, Ram said the party would fight first election to lose, next to get noticed and the third election to win. In 1988, he contested in Allahabad against a future Prime Minister V. P. Singh and performed impressively but lost polling close to 70,000 votes.

He unsuccessfully contested from East Delhi (Lok Sabha constituency) (against HKL Bhagat) and Amethi (Lok Sabha constituency) (against Rajiv Gandhi) in 1989 and came in the third position on both the seats. Then he represented the 11th Lok Sabha (1996-1998) from Hoshiarpur, Kanshiram was also elected as member of Lok Sabha from Etawah in Uttar Pradesh.

After Demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Kanshi Ram joined hands to keep communal forces out of power by creating unity among the backward and Dalit castes and giving the popular slogan " Mile Mulayam-Kanshi Ram, Hawa mein ud gaye Jai Shri Ram" (When Mulayam & Kanshiram come together, Jai Shri Ram vanishes). After the election, a coalition government of Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party was formed in UP under the leadership of Mulayam Singh Yadav, although due to some differences and Mayawati's ambition, this alliance broke up in June 1995, Mayawati became first time Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh in support of BJP. In the late 1990s, Ram described the BJP as the most corrupt ( mahabrasht) party in India and the Indian National Congress, Samajwadi Party and Janata Dal as equally corrupt. In 2001, he declared Mayawati as his successor.

Mayawati his successor said "Saheb Kanshi Ram and I had decided that we will convert and adopt Buddhism when we will get 'absolute majority' at the centre. We wanted to do this because we can make a difference to the religion by taking along with us millions of people. If we convert without power then only we two will be converting. But when you have power you can really create a stir". Mayawati claims Saheb Kanshi Ram's legacy

In 2017, a [[Hindi]]-language Biopic film ''The Great Leader Kanshiram'' was released in India, directed and produced by Arjun Singh, based on the story of DS4, [[BAMCEF]] and Bahujan Samaj Party founder Kanshi Ram from his childhood to 1984.