Jesus and Ambedkar: The Relevance of the Emancipatory Correlation between Jesus and Dr. Ambedkar to the Contemporary Indian Catholic Church

Being built on the values like, justice, equality, liberty and fraternity, the preamble of Indian Constitution, the existing caste-based divisive situation in India, is worrisome. Obviously, constant effort has been taken to undo the caste discriminative factors at various times, by different individuals. Among those individuals, Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar stands unique. Being born in the same oppressive situation, he deeply analyzed the caste system, vigorously fought this systemic evil, organized people, initiated its systematic eradication and tirelessly worked for justice and equity. His sacrifice is not exclusively for Dalits, but to all who are oppressed, neglected, discriminated, and exploited. Thereby Dr. Ambedkar becomes a universal icon to fight injustice and inequality. Deeply impressed by this great human being, I find those values of Dr. Ambedkar are nothing but the Kingdom values, preached and lived by Jesus. In Christian sense, I would say that God instrumented Dr. Ambedkar to realize His Kingdom values in our times. Truly, this accommodative understanding would help us to get inspired by the prophetic role of Dr. Ambedkar and work for the emancipation of the oppressed in our localities