We can’t get another VTR & another DV

SHYAM LAL GAUTAM, DELHI (ADDRESS WITHHELD)



This is my second communication on the “DV closing down” subject. (DV Sept.16, 2010 p.17: “If DV is allowed to die, Dalits will die as slaves”.


The most important thing that the Debate has revealed is that DV has circulation all over India and outside. But most of the subscribers are poor.


If such an all-India journal is allowed to be closed down (I am sure it will not), to establish another DV it will take another 30 years. VTR will not be there. And we can’t get a writer of the calibre of VTR.


An OBC, VTR united six disjointed SC/ST/BCs and Muslim/Christian/Sikhs and channelised their energies to fight our common enemy — the Brahminic tyrant.


Jewel in the crown of Babasaheb: Can we find a visionary like him? Our educated Dalits, the IAS/IPS walas enjoying their slavery are not even aware of this jewel in the “crown of Babasaheb”.


Budha and Babasaheb wanted to build the Bahujan Samaj but in UP the OBC Yadavas hate the BSP Govt. OBCs prefer to go with Brahmins fearing that joining Dalits would degrade them in society.


I think the fall of DV shows that the Dalit community has met with defeat.


Perfect Bahujan journal: I have not seen one OBC willing to stand by Dalits. But VTR, an OBC, not only took up the cause of Dalits but made DV the best Dalit journal. He even included the unwilling Muslims. And Sikhs. But the “educated” Dalits, ungrateful to even their own Father (Babasaheb), are ditching their brother (VTR).


I am a poor man. VTR knows my financial situation. But the hundreds of IAS/IPS/Income Tax, Customs and such other high paid Dalit officers with fat salaries and fatter bribes have not even read DV.


Rajya Sabha offer rejected: If VTR had accepted Kanshi Ram offer, he would have been a MP (Rajya Sabha). But he preferred to keep out of politics at a time when every Dalit is moving heaven and earth to get “power” which brings money.


But VTR still lives in a rented house in Bangalore and leads a modest life, always found in simple khadi-kurta and pyjama. Shunning all publicity, spending almost 12 hours a day in DV work.


Dalit issue internationalised: Author of over 100 books, with world-wide travel experience, VTR was the first person to internationalise the Dalit problem. Even President Obama as a law professor had read his book, Dalit — The Black Untouchables of India, published from USA. He led two delegation to China, the future super power of the world with which he is in close touch.

Writing about VTR (read the book, VTR — Friend, Philosopher & Guide, by Iqbal Ahmed Shariff, DSA-2009, Rs. 100) is an endless job.


We cannot get a person like VTR. And we cannot get another DV — if we kill it today.






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