Bombay HC seeks status report from state on publication of Ambedkar’s writings

The Bombay High Court HC on Wednesday sought a status report from the Maharashtra government about an ongoing project to publish the collected writings and speeches of Dr Babasaheb AmbedkarA bench of Justice P B Varale and Justice A S Kilor issued a notice to the government and asked it to file a reply within three weeksIn December 2021 the HC had taken suo motu on its own notice of newspaper reports that the project had come to a standstillTerming the project as ldquoabsolutely necessary and desirablerdquo it had said the delay reflected a ldquosorry state of affairsrdquo and directed the court registry to convert the issue into a public interest litigation PILOn Wednesday advocate Swaraj Jadhav who has been appointed to argue the PIL said the government set up the Babasaheb Ambedkar Source Material Publication Committee way back in 1979 but ldquonothing much was donerdquoAmbedkar had delivered several important speeches outside India too and some of them were published in the international media advocate Jadhav said adding that these speeches and reports should be incorporated in the projectThe HC said the committeersquos remit would cover everythingldquoWhen the state took a decision to publish Ambedkarrsquos speeches and writings there was no bar on those published in the international media There are even some interviews So the committee can consider everythingrdquo the HC saidldquoWe donrsquot think a specific direction is required to include material published in the international media We will ask the state to file a proper reply and tell us what is the status of the committee and the entire projectrdquo it further saidStatersquos lawyer Poornima Kantharia said the government would offer a ldquopositive response to all the issues raised in the PILrdquoThe court pointed out that the chairperson of the committee had died a few months ago so the government would have to make new appointment or reconstitute the whole panelAs per the report published in the Marathi daily Loksatta 33000 copies of Ambedkarrsquos writings had been published as part of the project and only 3675 had been made available for distribution3675No of copies out of 33K of Ambedkarrsquos work printedThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever