Documents obtained under the Right to Information (RTI) Act indicate that he is the only national leader who does not have a memorial.
Chandrakant Bhandhare, a government employee and Ambedkarite, who filed an RTI on February 23, 2011, had asked the Urban Development Ministry, the Central Public Works Department (CPWD), and the Ministry of Home Affairs for details on the policy of granting land for Rajghat and memorials of national leaders in New Delhi and other areas in the country.
“Why is there no memorial 56 years after Dr. Ambedkar's death? Isn't he a national leader? When I asked for information, I got a list of 14 national leaders who have memorials. There is no mention of Babasaheb in that list,” Mr. Bhandhare told The Hindu .
He asked if Dr. Ambedkar, who was posthumously conferred the Bharat Ratna in 1990, was considered a national leader and if the government had any plans of allocating land for a national memorial of the Rajghat type for him in New Delhi and Mumbai.
The CPWD said that Dr. Ambedkar was a national leader, but did not say anything on building a memorial for him.
In a reply dated April 5, 2011, it gave the names and location of memorials dedicated to 14 national leaders — Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi, Sanjay Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Charan Singh, Zail Singh, Jagjivan Ram, Devi Lal, K.R. Narayanan, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, the former Prime Minister, Chandra Shekhar and the former President, Shankar Dayal Sharma.
The Urban Development Ministry gave a vague reply with only details of Rajghat to which 89 acres was allotted in 1978, and about some land allotted for Indira Gandhi's memorial. The Ministry of Home Affairs said it had no information on the matter.
In 2002, the then Maharashtra Chief Minister, Vilasrao Deshmukh, headed a committee which decided on a four-phase development of a memorial for Dr. Ambedkar. But matters came to standstill after that.
Republican Party of India (RPI) activists have been demanding a memorial for Dr. Ambedkar and last year things picked up momentum with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party trying to outdo each other with their fervour for a memorial.
The demand became vociferous from all parties before elections to the local bodies got under way in December. In the winter session of the Legislature, both Houses, which witnessed a ruckus over this issue, decided that the entire Indu Mills land must be given up for the memorial.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had promised the entire 12.5 acres of Indu Mills land for a memorial for Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar in Dadar. In December 2011, the Prime Minister approved in principle the demand. An all-party delegation led by Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan met him in this connection.
The Indu Mills is located near Chaityabhoomi at Shivaji Park, where the Buddhist Society of India has dedicated a memorial to Dr. Ambedkar, visited by lakhs of his followers every year.
A secretary-level committee will decide the formalities of the handover of the land, possessed by the National Textile Corporation. The land was to be handed over by January 31..
