Around 5,000 Dalits and Adivasis from all over Gujarat converted to Buddhism on Sunday in protest against what the event organisers called the dual policy of upper caste Hindus 'to use these backward classes in riots against Muslims, but dumping them later'.
The cock-a-snook move at the State Government's recently enacted anti-conversion law was organised by the Viswa Bouddha Sangh (VBS) at an impressive rally in Vadodara where several monks chanted hymns from the scriptures.
The conversion ceremony was earlier scheduled for June this year. It had to be cancelled at the eleventh hour as the district administration did not grant permission in view of the state's anti-conversion law, known as the 'Freedom of Religion Act'. The Narendra Modi Government passed the law soon after coming back to power. The programme was re-scheduled for this day as Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar too had converted thousands of Dalits to Buddhism on Dussehra Day in 1956, in protest against the discrimination by the upper caste Hindus, the organisers said.
Though the gathering at Sunday's conversion rally was much less than the one lakh claimed by the organisers earlier, the very fact that nearly 5,000 Dalits embraced Buddhism despite the state's anti-conversion law is an embarrassment for the BJP government.
Vadodara District Collector Bhagyesh Jha told the Hindustan Times that he had not granted permission for the conversions in the absence of a list of the estimated one lakh people the organisers claimed would be coming for the rally. The Police Commissioner would proceed against the organisers if anyone was found to have been converted under force or allurement, Jha indicated.