First things first! Endorsing Dhananjay Keer’s monumental biography of Babasaheb Ambedkar, Veer Savarkar observed that Keer’s style was fascinating and that the biography was “so truthfully written." “This life of Dr Ambedkar," Savarkar wrote, “should be read and studied by every youth who aspires to take part in the public life of our country and it should be found on the shelf of every library worth the name."

Keer’s biography of Babasaheb, retains an abiding value and presence. Despite numerous attempts to marginalise it, its essence, authenticity and centrality in any serious study of Babasaheb remains undiluted and cannot be ignored by the serious scholar and activist.

Babasaheb’s 50th birthday, which fell on 14 April 1942, was widely celebrated and commented upon. To the chagrin of many today, it will be useful to note that the “Bombay Provincial Hindu Sabha, by a special resolution, felicitated Ambedkar on his Golden Jubilee."

Keer records that the main function in the “series of the Golden Jubilee Celebrations was held at Chowpatty" on April 19 with Dr M.R. Jayakar of the Hindu Mahasabha presiding and Acharya Dhonde as Chairman of the Jubilee Committee. Processions from across the city converged into a mammoth gathering at Chowpatty. Dr Jayakar “told the vast audience how Dr Ambedkar’s independent line of thinking and action had brought a phenomenal change in the status of Depressed Classes and how it has infused confidence in them and awakened the caste Hindus…"

Savarkar’s was the most moving tribute and assessment on the occasion of Dr Ambedkar’s fiftieth birthday. Ambedkar’s personality, erudition and capacity to lead and organize", wrote Savarkar, “would have by themselves marked him out as an outstanding asset to our Nation. But in addition to that the inestimable services he has rendered to our Motherland in trying to stamp out untouchability and the result he has achieved in instilling a manly spirit of self-confidence in the millions of the Depressed Classes, constitute an abiding, patriotic as well as humanitarian achievement. The very fact of the birth of such a towering personality........

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