Dr. B. R. Ambedkar

More than 165 million untouchables in India are condemned to a lifetime of abuse simply because of their caste, according to Human Rights Watch. Former untouchables who have immigrated to North America advocate for fair land distribution and elimination of caste inequality in their homeland.

Buddhist human rights activists like Varhade are inspired by former untouchable and fellow Buddhist Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, who helped draft the Indian constitution in 1947. “Ambedkar gave them hope for a better future,” said Lynch, one of the leading experts on untouchables in India. Ambedkar is also credited for sparking the Buddhist revival movement in India’s untouchable community, according to Robert Thurman, professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies at Columbia University.

Spreading Ambedkar’s message and the Buddhist faith is a higher calling, according to many former untouchables. “We were slaves for 2,000 years because of this concept of caste that Hindus said was from God,” said Raju Kamble, a former untouchable who now lives in Calgary, Canada and works for the Ambedkar International Mission. “This movement created an ideological base for people to get out of slavery.”

Many former untouchables in North America are using their newly acquired privileges to help clothe, feed and educate the lower caste of India. Sanjay Kumar helped start the “Be Educated” movement, which raises money in North America to build libraries all over India with the exclusive mission to educate the poorest—usually untouchables—about their rights. “Some of us who started the project were from very poor, underprivileged communities and have struggled to come up so we know the problems that exist,” said Kumar. “I visited a couple of the villages and I can see that people still need to be uplifted.”