Ashok Gopal, Lecture on ‘The Ambedkar Archive: A Biographer's View’

Centre for the Study of Developing Societies
and Navayana Publishing Pvt. Ltd.
invite you to a lecture
The Ambedkar Archive: A Biographer's View
by Ashok Gopal
Chair: Nishikant Kolge
Tuesday, 16 May 2023, 4.30 pm IST
The lecture will be held on Zoom
Link: bit.ly/3p7F2EK
Meeting ID: 87439028295
Passcode: csdsdelhi
When Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar passed away in 1956, publicly available documents related to his life and thoughts were scanty. A state effort to publish his writings and speeches was initiated in 1976, but decades before several Dalit followers of Ambedkar and scholars worked to collect and preserve documents related to his life and work. The output of their efforts and state-funded volumes of Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Writings and Speeches, constitutes the 'Ambedkar archive'. What is the scope and condition of this archive, what are the significant gaps and ongoing efforts to expand it and what unexplored directions for research does the archive provide? The speaker will discuss these questions based on his recently published book A Part Apart: The Life and Thought of B.R. Ambedkar (2023).
Ashok Gopal has worked as a journalist, consultant for NGOs, curriculum designer and educational content developer and lives in Pune. He has been studying the life and thought of Babasaheb Ambedkar since 2004 and is the author of the book A Part Apart: The Life and Thought of B. R. Ambedkar, published by Navayana recently.
Nishikant Kolge is Associate Professor at Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi.