Mahatmahood – Arundhati Roy

I love it. The animus. Critical rejoice. Arundhati Roy searing on the exposure of the Gandhi myth, in sight of the career of Ambedkar, in her introduction to the Annotated Critical edition of Annihilation of Caste : The Doctor and the Saint.
How she takes her tone from Ambedkar’s; a relay in “searing insolence”, “ferocious attack”, “this rage, this audacious denunciation”, and “defiance”.

Noreworthy comparisons also (she makes historical synonymies) with her political causes and militant experience – business backing to Gandhi, like corporate backing to NGOs for ex.

“Mahatmaji” – as in “Let not the people of Vykom or any other place fear that Mahatmaji wants caste abolished. Mahatmaji does not want the caste system abolished but holds that untouchability should be abolished … M does not want you to dine with Thiyaz or Lulayas. What he wants is that we must be prepared to touch or go near other human beings as you go near a cow or a horse…” (Congress leader reassures caste Hindus, at Vaikom satyagraha, 1924.)