It was Dr. B.R. Ambedkar who said that democracy is “essentially an attitude of respect and reverence towards fellowmen.” When Ambedkar went to the depth of a definition of democracy, he would not have thought that his colleagues in Parliament, in the succeeding generations, would be stoopping down to the level of casteist charlatans.

K. Sudhakaran, a senior Congress leader and parliamentarian from Kerala, was not even born when the first Constituent Assembly of India had met to draft a constitution for free India with Ambedkar as Chairman.
It would be great if the leaders of the Congress party started reading the debates in the Constituent Assembly—before reading the Indian Constitution to talk about ‘equality.’ Ambedkar had forewarned that caste as a structure of social reality would be enduring, as long as you don’t get your mind decolonised, disinfected, and dissipated – from the remnants of historically entrenched prejudices.

One wonders if Mr. Sudhakaran would again emerge with a spate of excuses—like that ‘I was misquoted,’ that ‘my words should have been heard in its totality’ etc. etc. Two years back, his ‘apology’ would have saved him for a while, but it was accompanied by ‘excuses.’

As a Parliamentarian having some responsibilities in the Standing Committee on the Welfare of OBCs, K. Sudhakaran is expected to know the nuances of caste abuse and prejudices. Any such abuses on anyone, be it the Prime Minister or the Chief Minister, or any ordinary citizen, would be tantamount to challenging the very Constitutional morality and principles, upon which a seat in Parliament is legitimately ensured.