BODHI, the Bahujan Hitay Pune Project, and the ongoing work of Dr Ambedkar

In June 2019 the 16th Sakyadhita conference will be held, for the first time ever in Australia. See here for details. These are large meetings; the previous one, held in Hong Kong in 2017, attracted about 800 attendees from 31 countries. BODHI Australia will be attending this meeting, represented by at least 4 committee members and one partner, Karunadeepa. Below is the summary of our paper, and below that is our current draft of the full paper.

The paper is designed to be read; some repetition is deliberate

Authors: Maxine Ross, Karunadeepa, Emilia Della Torre; Colin D. Butler

Summary: In 1956 the great reformer Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar led, in Nagpur, India, a mass conversion to Buddhism, involving at least 300,000 people. Millions more have since converted in an ongoing social movement, still keenly needed, reaching for greater justice in India, particularly for women, and particularly for Dalits, once called “untouchables”. Since 2005 the NGO BODHI Australia (founded in 1989) has supported the work of a team led by Karunadeepa, a Dalit whose grandfather took part in the historic Nagpur conversion, and who for decades has worked for an Indian NGO, based in Pune, India, itself largely supported by the UK Karuna Trust, allied with Triratna, whose founder (Venerable Sangharakshita) first met Dr Ambedkar in 1952. The work BODHI Australia has supported with Karunadeepa and her team mainly seeks to enhance the life-chances of slum-dwellers, especially migrants from rural Maharashtra (not necessarily Dalit, nor Buddhist) by improving education, health and awareness of family planning. In 2017 Karunadeepa, with Dalit colleagues, started to develop a new NGO, the Bahujan Hitay Pune Project, entirely governed by Dalit women, which will extend and deepen this work, but which also presents new challenges. In this talk, Karunadeepa, during her first visit to Australia, will discuss these activities, together with representatives of BODHI Australia. BODHI’s work to support Dalit-led and other development-promoting projects in India may seem a drop but can also be seen as a key to inspire, to resist oppression, to support development and to assist escape from poverty and vulnerability.

Dr Ambedkar. https://www.culturalindia.net/reformers/br-ambedkar.html original source unknown

Full paper:

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This paper starts by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land this conference is held on, the Gundungurra, the Indigenous people who have thrived on this continent for at least 65,000 years. The authors of this paper are all apprentices of dharma. Between us, we have been exposed to about two centuries of close contact with Buddhism. One of us (Karunadeepa) was born Buddhist. However, none of us claim, or admit, deep knowledge of Buddhist scholarship. We thank the organisers of this historic conference for the opportunity to speak and to be published in this setting, alongside the work of people with far more scholarly knowledge of Buddhism than we will ever have.
The main motivation for this talk and essay is to provide information about the work of some followers (in Pune, India) of Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, who lived in India from 1891 until 1956. Dr Ambedkar was 65 years old when he died, coinciding with the Buddha Jayanti festival, to honour Buddhism’s 2500th year. The Dalai Lama first arrived in India, mainly to attend this celebration, only a few days before Dr Ambedkar died.

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The traditional Buddhist dharma wheel, representing interdependence and liberation, was added to the Indian national flag at Dr. Ambedkar’s suggestion. Here it is on a stamp, issued to celebrate 2500 years of Buddhism. Source

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While three of us were not born Buddhist, an important reason for our attraction to it is its links with social justice, or fairness, including its rejection of the principle that hereditarily transmitted inequality is legitimate. A basic teaching of many religions (maybe all of them) is the principle of cause and effect. In both Buddhism and Hinduism this principle is called karma, yet the dominant group in each of these two faiths, otherwise quite similar, appears to have a drastically different interpretation of this principle. Because we are not scholars, even more than from lack of time, we cannot trace these differences to early teachings. Instead, the observations in this paper are based mainly on our own personal experience, and our understanding of world events, both today and in the fairly recent past.

Whether or not there is a future life, the three authors of this paper, not born Buddhist, have all been, at various times, intensely moved by the unfairness of the social world, as was Dr Ambedkar, born a Hindu, but who converted to Buddhism in October 1956. This was in Nagpur, Maharashtra, in central India, at a mass gathering attended by over 300,000 people, one of whom was a grandfather of the fourth author of this paper, Karunadeepa, the only one of us who was born Buddhist.

In Australia, even among those of European descent, much inequality is passed through the generations, and along family lines, by privilege and unequal access to opportunity. Many people who are wealthy went to exclusive, expensive schools, where, in time, they send their own children. It is well-known, and not just allegation, that many rich people do not pay a fair share of tax. Mackenzie Bezos, the soon to be divorced wife of Jeff Bezos, the founder of the company Amazon, is reported to be due to receive almost US$70 billion in her divorce settlement. In so doing, she will become the richest woman in the world. Bezos, himself, is reported to have humble origins, the son of a teenage mother and a father who has been described as “deadbeat”. But his example of transition from hardship to fabulous wealth is more the exception than the rule.

Dr Ambedkar, who served as Law Minister in the first Indian government in 1947, was also exceptional. This was not through extraordinary entrepreneurial skills and alleged “robotization” of employees (the Bezos route), but from an vigorous and courageous intellect, some protection in childhood (due to descent from several generations of soldiers, including his father who rose to be an officer, in an army whose British leaders were far less caste-conscious than most Indians) (1) and hard work. Timing and history was also important. Ambedkar became a leading public figure through his central role in the struggle for Indian independence from Britain, recently reported as plundering the equivalent of $45 trillion from India during its long occupation (2).

We said that Dr Ambedkar was born Hindu. More accurately, as a member of the Mahar caste, he was born “untouchable”, meaning that close contact with him (even if indirect) was considered, by orthodox Hindus, to pollute or contaminate those who were conditioned, usually since birth, to consider themselves “higher born”, such as Brahmins.

For example, as a schoolboy, Ambedkar not only had to sit in a separate section at school (sometimes outside) but could not touch the tap if he was thirsty. In order to drink, a peon, considered “touchable” had to be found to turn it on.

Once, while travelling to visit his father, Ambedkar, aged 9, with a brother and two young nephews, all children, were stranded for over an hour at the station (following their first ever train ride), waiting for a servant that never arrived. The stationmaster was at first sympathetic to four well-dressed children, until discovering their lowly caste. Eventually, however, he helped them to find, with difficulty, a bullock cart driver, who agreed to take them to their destination, for twice the normal fee. But this was on condition that the children acted as driver while the driver walked, for fear of caste “pollution”. En route (on an overnight journey), as part of a harrowing ordeal, they were refused water (3).

Reflecting on this, Ambedkar wrote: “it left an indelible impression .. before this incident occurred, I knew that I was an untouchable, and that untouchables were subjected to certain indignities and discriminations.        All this I knew. But this incident gave me a shock such as I had never received before, and it made me think about untouchability--which, before this incident happened, was with me a matter of course, as it is with many touchables as well as the untouchables.

To non-Indigenous Australians the idea of caste might seem ludicrous. But there are traces of the caste system here too. We see it in films of past European royalty, and there are echoes in Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers and in the different punishments for white collar (executive) crime compared to those committed by blue collar wearers (working class). Discrimination based on skin colour, religion or age is officially banned (but persists) in Australia, though discrimination based on ability to pay is everywhere. We are nor arguing against laws and punishment, we are instead proclaiming support for the need for a fairer world, including of more equal opportunity.

Today, in India, the injustice of caste is milder, especially in urban areas, than in Dr Ambedkar’s time. This is partly due to Dr Ambedkar, partly to increased Westernisation of affluent Indians, and partly the work of liberal Hindus, such as the Ramakrishna mission. But chiefly, it is from the struggle and inspiration of tens of millions of people (sometimes called Dalits) who have renounced the legitimacy of caste as a concept. Karma may still exist, but it no longer can be unquestioningly interpreted as meaning, at least in India, that parental status and income completely determines one’s life course, though, naturally, the culture that children are reared in has a powerful “throwing” effect.

Many injustices still exist, in India and elsewhere, including for millions of “tribal” people. One group, seeking to reduce this injustice, and inspired by the teaching and legacy of Dr Ambedkar, is led by Karunadeepa. In 2017, with colleagues, almost all of whom are women, Karunadeepa started to develop a new non-government organization (NGO), called the Bahujan Hitay Pune Project. Since 1982, this work has been undertaken under the umbrella of a larger NGO, the Trailokya Baudha Maha Sangh Gana, but the time has come for a new, legally distinct group.

Bahujan refers to the people in the majority, meaning in India, “Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Castes”. Bahujan Hitay roughly translates as “for the welfare of many”. The work of the Bahujan Hitay Pune Project is principally with disadvantaged slum dwellers (scheduled castes and scheduled tribes) in this city of about six million, in the sprawling state of Maharashtra, parts of which are afflicted by drought and accompanying desperation, including farmer suicide. Consequently, many people migrate to Pune, seeking better conditions.

This work in Pune has, since 1982, been supported by the Karuna Trust a British charity founded by the late Ven Sangharakshita, who, as young man seeking to work for the good of Buddhism, based mainly in Kalimpong, in the Himalayan foothills, met Dr Ambedkar three times, including shortly before his conversion (4). Since 2005, this work led by Karunadeepa has also been supported by two NGOs with an Australian connection. These NGOs (BODHI and BODHI Australia) were co-founded by Colin Butler and his late wife Susan, in 1989. Since then, these groups have raised and distributed about A$0.5M to partners in six countries in Asia, mostly in India. The acronym means Benevolent Organisation for Development, Health and Insight. BODHI Australia also helps to support the Aryaloka Education Society, a Dalit-led NGO, based in Nagpur, which teaches basic computing skills, mostly to young women from poor villages.

In this talk, Karunadeepa, during her first visit to Australia, will discuss some of the activities of the Bahujan Hitay Pune Project. Four members of BODHI Australia’s committee, in addition to Karunadeepa, are attending the whole conference, and they hope to learn from and gain inspiration and encouragement from other individuals or NGOs engaged in similar development work.

Mrs Rubina Khan who trains slum dwellers in beauty therapy and hairdressing trainer. With permission.These three photos were taken in Pune, Maharashtra, India, in March 2018 (by Colin Butler)

Mrs Sushma Chavan, an assistant teacher in the an assistant teacher at the Hadaspar balwadi (kindergarten) (Pune), with her two daughters.

The boy (Aniketh) is soon to have surgery - provided for free by the Indian government. 

Whether or not there is a future life, we believe that the creation of good karma is important to try to reduce suffering, in this life. In our understanding of Buddhism, core values are compassion (karuna) and wisdom (panna or prajna), while the first Noble truth refers to the reality of suffering, not only of the perceiver, but also of others – human, animal and even Nature herself.

In the three decades of BODHI’s work the barriers facing partner organizations, in order to receive foreign funds have worsened. This steepens the challenge to reach the poorest people and to promote genuinely long-lasting development. But there is still great need. We ask for your support, either directly, or in many other ways.

References

1.  Queen C. The Great Conversion. Dr. Ambedkar and Buddhist Revival in India. Tricycle. 1993.

2. Patnaik U. How the British impoverished India. Hindustan Times. 2018.
3. Ambedkar BR. Waiting for a visa. In: Moon V, editor. Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches. Bombay, India: Education Department, Government of Maharashtra; 1993.
4. Sangharakshita U. Ambedkar and Buddhism: Windhorse Publications; 1986. Free pdf of book here.

  
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BODHI at 25

BODHI (Benevolent Organisation for Development, Health and Insight) is the NGO (non-governmental organisation) development charity, that I co-founded with the late Susan Woldenberg Butler in July 1989. When I wrote the first draft of this in May 2014 we were almost 25 years old (we then knew of Susan's diagnosis with stage IV pancreatic cancer but it was Susan's wish to not make that public during her life). We currently have autonomous branches in the US (California) and Australia (originally based in Tasmania, now in Canberra).
 
BODHI has a Buddhist influence – it may even be the second oldest strongly Buddhist influenced development NGO based in the West; certainly in Australia. Tzu Chi, based in Taiwan, is about two decades older and about 3 orders of magnitude bigger (branches in numerous countries, they have wonderful hospitals in Taiwan and perhaps  other countries, such as one planned in Indonesia.) The Karuna Trust, in the UK, is also older.

The Dalai Lama has been BODHI’s patron since 1989, the year he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, perhaps because it was also the year of the Tiananmen Square atrocities. I have met the Dalai Lama several times, the first in 1985 when I spent 10 months mostly studying the health problems of developing countries, including medical student electives in Nigeria and Nepal; I also that year met the Minister of Health of the Tibetan government in exile (in Dharamsala, India) – at that time my ambition was to specialise in infectious diseases of poverty, and to do a PhD looking at TB treatment of Tibetan refugees in India (of whom there were over 100,000, even then.) (I last met His Holiness in Sankissa, Uttar Pradesh, in February 2015.)

Prior to 1985 I had searched for a Buddhist–influenced NGO to volunteer for, but could not find one, instead studying general medicine and public health,with Christian missions in Nigeria in both hospital and community settings and later with the Britain Nepal Medical Trust, who work on TB control and reduction. I met Susan in Delhi, by chance, that year, and later we corresponded. I did have the idea of BODHI (though not the name) in 1985 but it seemed beyond reach – but not to Susan with whom I discussed it when we next met (for Buddhist teachings by the Dalai Lama) in Los Angeles in 1989.

So we started it in July 1989, first in the US, then in Australia. Susan and I eventually married in 1991, a few months after our first newsletter, BODHI Times. There are now 48 such newsletters, Susan had started number 47 before she got too sick to complete it.

BODHI's first project was to try to prevent rabies among Tibetan exiles in south India. Then we expanded to supporting Tibetan promotors of education. In the late 1990s we started the “revolving sheep bank” in Tibet. That's a long story - the Dalai Lama had recommended we work in Tibet when we met him in 1990 - and eventually we were able to do this via Professor Melvyn Goldstein, who is a leading Tibetologist. Susan and I met Mel (and his partner Dr Cynthia Beale) at Case Western University, Ohio, USA in 1996.

For many years the income BODHI received was tiny ($4k, then $6k, eventually $10k pa then $25k, then $50k, now $80k in 2013, but falling to $50K in 2014), but we always had some support and encouragement, eg the late Swiss industrialist Baron von Thyssen-Bornemisza gave us US$1,000 for six consecutive bi-annual newsletters in our very early years. Gradually, income has increased but we are still small (average development NGO income in Australia is, coincidentally, about $70K per annum). (I can't find the evidence for this but here are some facts - Australians seem quite generous to charities, but our official foreign aid budget is lamentably mean, and has just been cut further.) BODHI US, so far, is less successful.

BODHI's current projects are mainly in India (especially in Pune and the Changlang district of Arunachal Pradesh) and Bangladesh, in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. We also used to provide some scholarships for poor Muslim girls, in Dhaka. Since Susan died this has not been possible, but might be in the future.
 
Our main target communities in South Asia are dalits and Chakmas (did you see the news coverage re two 14 year old dalit girls who were hanged in early 2014 in Uttar Pradesh?) They were Buddhist. 

There are between 10 and 30 million dalits in India who have converted to Buddhism. We no longer do any projects with Tibetans; we can't do everything, and in general, Tibetans in exile are not so disadvantaged any more, though they sure have a hard time in Tibet. (There is a short version of a chapter I wrote about Tibetan self-immolation here.)

Since the start, BODHI has been very strict in not providing any funds for religious or overtly political purposes. Religion is fine, but it's far more important to get adequate nutrition as a child, and to learn to read, write and count. (I nearly became a Buddhist monk in 1976; instead I decided to study medicine, now I work entirely in public health). 

It's also important to receive kindness, to not be exploited and to grow up and learn in an ethical environment; but no religion or philosophy has a monopoly on those characteristics.

BODHI's money goes mainly for education (it's the easiest - though you still need to find honest and effective school administrators) livelihood training (also a kind of education) and health. We work exclusively with NGOs based in developing countries, with whom we have a relationship and trust. Us trying to directly administer a school or clinic etc would just be too hard, too expensive, and probably could not be sustained for long - we have never tried that route. 

Health is actually very hard to fund on a shoestring, though we do sometimes fund community health clinics, both in villages and in a slum in Pune. But their effectiveness is probably limited. Instead we have chosen to focus more on trying to improve the determinants of health, especially education and human rights.

Donations are entirely from the public, though BODHI US did get a very small grant a few years back, and we almost got another from Buddhist Global Relief (to provide eggs at school for very poor children in Uttar Pradesh at some of the schools I visited in 2009) ... but that failed as the eating of eggs turned out to be tabooed by some of the parents and it got too complicated to administer.

Our third Australian director, Dr Denis Wright (a Bangladeshi specialist at the University of New England) died in December 2013, following 4 years suffering from a GBM (a malignant brain tumour). In those 4 years we hinted to a few people we thought might be suitable to become a replacement director, and we directly asked 2 people (both Chakmas – the Chakma community in Australia has no tax deductible charity of its own; BODHI is probably the largest NGO in Australia supporting Chakmas.) (Chakmas are a non-Muslim ethnic minority, mainly in SE Bangladesh, NE India and parts of Arakan, Myanmar. They face a lot of discrimination in Bangladesh and some parts of India.) Neither could find the time, but they continue to assist in other ways.

However, in 2014, Dr Indira Samarawickremahttp://www.bodhi.net.au/html/directorsandofficers.html, who has a strong background in community medicine, and who is originally from Sri Lanka, agreed to be BODHI Australia's third director. That was wonderful news. Since then Dr Marty Rubin, a founding director of BODHI US has agreed to be a board member of BODHI Australia, so too had Dr Julie Adamson, a paediatrician in Newcastle, Australia, with whom I started medical school (also in Newcastle) in 1980. 

Mind you, in 2015 we realised that out constitution has no specific roles for directors (only committee members) so the directors are now "local advisers". (We also have a committee: a president, a secretary, a treasurer and a public officer.)

There are many critics of aid (eg William Easterly), and there are some strong supporters, eg Jeffrey Sachs. An awful lot of aid is wasted, and there are many reasons for that. A big problem is that the social and governance structures of most big countries have no genuine interest in lifting the living standards of the poor, but instead use aid to buy political influence (eg so a poor country votes for a rich country in the UN).

There is also phantom aid and there is boomerang aid. 

Another really big problem is that corrupt government aid recipients in many poor countries (eg Chad) have minimal if any interest in the general welfare of their own people, instead favouring one tribe, ethnic group, religion, gender, or perhaps the military.  Paul Collier's book "The Bottom Billion"  has a pretty good discussion of aid, and is far less dismissive than Easterly. However Collier has some big blind spots, especially to environmental determinants of well-being, and also to the harmful effects of rapid population growth, which contribute to entrapment in poverty.

After 25 years of experience I know aid is very hard to do well. But there is definitely a niche for groups of our size (though we'd like to get a bit bigger). Australian government aid scarcely goes to India anymore, though that does not mean there is any shortage of misery and exploitation there. But even if it did go to the Indian government, the chance of anything trickling down to the marginalised groups BODHI works with is minimal. 

For example, the morale and accountability among Indian teachers, especially those who work in poor or remote areas, is abysmal. There are numerous factors in Indian society which limit its own capacity to lift itself up. I personally think teachers in under-privileged parts of India should be paid more (than in richer parts), but that won't work unless it's properly enforced. And, it's very hard for illiterate, under-nourished parents of children whose education is being neglected, to effectively complain to some official; in fact it's virtually impossible.

There are benefits from involvement in BODHI which greatly exceed the monetary value of the projects. These take the form of learning (including in my case, learning about how to improve world health), they also, I believe, serve as a model, a prompt, for others, Buddhist or not. Perhaps BODHI and other NGOs give others hope. However, getting funds to the poorest of the poor is almost impossible. Such groups need champions, and their champions rarely if ever have the means and skill to even communicate with us, let alone account for money that we might send. 

But, not far above the really really poor there are (in India and elsewhere) millions of people who are still extremely poor and with whom progress can be made. I guess you could say that BODHI's work is mainly with that group. We can hope that, gradually, some of them - who are locally based - will in turn work with even poorer people. In 2014 I was interviewed by an Indian journalist, working for Down to Earth. We discussed poverty in India. She expressed concern about the poor but mentioned how her own parents were not very sympathetic to them. But perhaps the journalist's parents had grown up in relative hardship (or maybe the grandparents had). There seems to be an early stage of wealth accumulation where concern to reduce the poverty of others is really limited, but after a while, at least some people start to feel more secure, and start to share a bit, not to resent paying taxes (especially if they can see tax money being used for the benefit of poor), agitate for public health, education or the fair application of laws.

Though there are also some people who seem intent on just getting richer and richer, though there are exceptions: both Bill Gates and Warren Buffet have pledged to give lots of it away; and in Gates' case he has.

Involvement in aid can also help us value what we have here and be more sensitive to outrages like the plight of (as mentioned) those two hanged cousins in Uttar Pradesh, and a host of other atrocities, whether in India or South Sudan (etc).
 
We always have the choice – we can look the other way, or try to do something. We don’t need to be saints to do something.