"I don't have an address,” wrote renowned scholar Gail Omvedt in her profile in the alumni section of the University of California, Berkeley.
One of the country's finest scholars and sociologists, Omvedt, who turned 81 earlier this month, passed away on August 25, leaving behind a rich body of work on Ambedkar, dalits, caste, and women. Born in Minneapolis, USA, Omvedt was cremated at Kasegaon in Maharashtra's Sangli district, the place which had been her home for the last 40 years, even as her activism and academic work took her to various parts of the country and world.
She graduated from UC Berkeley's sociology department in 1964 and earned a doctorate in 1973. Omvedt, who actively participated in anti-war protests in the US, first came to India as a 22-year-old. Her doctoral research on anti-brahmin movements in Maharashtra that brought her to India in 1971. Her teacher, Eleanor Zelliot, had earlier researched on dalits and has been credited with introducing Ambedkar to the West.
“When trying to combine living in India and teaching at San Diego didn't work, I quit and went to India,” Gail wrote. She married Marxist activist Bharat Patankar and become an Indian citizen in 1983.
Instead of confining herself to researching caste, Omvedt actively participated in the social and anti-caste movements, often questioning the non-inclusion of dalits and adivasis from the environment and Left movements leaderships. Along with her husband, she founded Shramik Mukti Dal. Her research work on Ambedkar, dalits, Jotirao Phule also influenced Kanshi Ram, as she was closely associated with the All India Backward and Minority Communities Employees Federation (BAMCEF), a body BSP floated to organise dalits.
In her book, Seeking Begumpura, a utopian anti-caste tax-free and sorrowless society as envisaged by Ravidas, she pitches the concept against the Ram Rajya propounded by Gandhi, the socialist ideals shaped by Brahmanical vision of Nehru, and the Hindutva vision based on the presumed golden era of the Vedas and its caste system. She argues that it was time to reimagine India through the ideals of the subaltern intellectuals who envisioned it as a more just society.
In her writing on women, she argued that caste should not be ignored. Among her key books, some of which serve as guiding lights on Dalit history, include Cultural Revolt in a Colonial Society; Understanding Caste: From Buddha to Ambedkar and Beyond; Seeking Begumpura: The Social Vision of Anti-caste Intellectuals; Ambedkar: Towards an Enlightened India (Penguin, 2005), Dalits and the Democratic Revolution; Reinventing Revolution: New Social Movements and the Socialist Tradition in India; We Shall Smash this Prison: Indian Women in Struggle.
Her scholarship led her to undertake many roles as a teacher and researcher in universities like Pune and Ignou. She also had a consultant role with the UNDP.
When India re-discovers Ambedkar and Jotiba Phule, or when dalits assert their identity, Gail Omvedt's contribution in bringing them to academia and to dalit households will be remembered.
