From Oakland to Mumbai: How the Black Panthers Sparked a Dalit Revolution

August 27, 2026
Staff Writer
Article, Save India

In this article, Jana Eid traces how the radical ethos of America’s Black Power movement
crossed borders to inspire a new wave of anti-caste resistance in 1972 India.

From the poor urban alleys of Mumbai in 1972 emerged an organization not different at all from
the Black Panther Party in the U.S., a militant organization that reshaped Black political
consciousness and the battle for equal rights among Black Americans. Two angry young men,
Namdeo Dhasal and J.V. Pawar, decided to pivot from the post-Ambedkar Dalit leadership at the
time when they discovered a copy ofTimemagazinethat featured the Black Panthers of the U.S.
Emboldened by the same vision of self-reliance and self-defense, they strove to create a different
reality for Dalits through separation from state institutions.
Since the nineteenth century, scholars and political activists have drawn connections between
racial discrimination against Black people in the U.S. and the historically revered caste system in
India. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar couldn’t help but recognize this similarity when he studied at
Columbia University in New York, establishing communication with Black rights activists there.
He realized that although the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (which abolished
slavery) and the 14th Amendment (which provided citizenship rights to all people born in the
U.S. regardless of color) had been passed many years earlier, not a single Black student was able
to gain admission to Columbia University. He learned from civil rights luminaries of the time,
like Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois, about the fight for freedom and racial equality.
The word “educate” in Ambedkar’s revolutionary three-point formula for Dalits—“Educate!
Organize! Agitate!”—was inspired by Washington’s book,Up From Slavery, which emphasizes
the importance of education in obtaining freedom for Black people. Du Bois is known for his
96-page petition, the Manifesto of Universal Human Rights, to the United Nations, which
embodies the first constitutional dissent against racism. In 1946, Ambedkar wrote a letter to Du
Bois in which he noted:
”I was a student of the problems of Negro people and here there is such a striking
similarity between the condition of the Untouchables in India and the condition of
the Negroes that I find it is not only natural for me to study their condition but it is
imperative… like the human rights petition of the Negroes of America, the question
of the Indian Untouchables should also be put forth in the UN and a copy of the
petition submitted for this purpose should be sent to me on my address” (“The Black
Panther-Dalit Panther Connection”).
Little did Ambedkar know that Black people in the U.S. and Dalits in India would be bonded in
their struggle for social justice. The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was formed in 1966 by
two young individuals, Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale, who were forced to find a way to
defend themselves against constant police terror that primarily targeted Black youth.The Dalit Panthers movement was formed under the same pressure to protect Dalits from social
elites and state forces that used sheltered affirmative action policies and violence as a means of
social repression. Since the beginning of the 1970s, widespread disillusionment had surfaced
among marginalized segments of society against the political rhetoric of development and social
justice proposed by ruling elites. The state’s desire to achieve a substantive form of social
democracy and economic justice created a prominent break within Dalit political consciousness,
where various movements emerged to reconstruct the essence of Dalit empowerment outside of
state institutions. Two extreme incidents of caste atrocities incited Dalit youth to establish the
Dalit Panthers. On May 14, 1972, two women from a Dalit settlement on the outskirts of a
village (termed ‘Maharwada’ or ‘Rajwada’) were stripped and paraded naked through the village
in a display of the humiliation tactics commonly employed against Dalit women. Within the
same year, the eyes of two Dalit men were gouged out by upper-caste people in Dhakali village,
in the Akola district. Oftentimes, when upper-caste people are involved in a caste atrocity, the
state sides with them and imprisons the Dalit victims.
In the same way that the Black Panther movement antagonized the passive, non-violent,
assimilationist model championed by Martin Luther King Jr. and other reformist leaders, the
Dalit Panthers movement distinguished itself from the conventional liberal model of democratic
politics embraced by post-Ambedkar Dalit leadership by articulating a kind of romantic
militancy. They were primarily newly educated Dalits, young artists, poets, unemployed youth,
and social activists—all of whom were committed to challenging the political establishment and
status quo through street protests and emotive speeches. Members of the organization started
publishing pamphlets full of revolutionary poetry, magazines covering current affairs, and
literary writings that united the Dalit community through a common political conscience. The
organization was not afraid to bring issues of rape, violence, and caste atrocities into mainstream
discourse to occupy the center stage of political deliberations. In 1973, the Dalit Panthers
Manifesto was released as a revolutionary agenda by Dhasal and Raja Dhale, outlining
Ambedkar’s teachings within a Marxist class framework that declared Dalits must become the
rulers of the land. It famously stated:
“We will not be satisfied easily now. We do not want a little place in the Brahmin
alley…We want the rule of the whole land. We are not looking at persons but at a
system. Change of heart, liberal education, etc., will not end our state of
exploitation. When we gather a revolutionary mass, rouse the people, out of the
struggle of this giant mass will come the tidal wave of revolution” (Dalit Panthers
Manifesto, p. 146).
In the May 11, 1974 edition of their official newspaper, the Black Panther Party announced its
support and appreciation of the Dalit Panthers. The organization was able to establish itself as a
serious and committed group by undermining the liberal democratic system that served the
interests of social elites.What comprised essential elements of the Dalit Panthers movement also ended up leading to its
demise. The Panthers were ideologically conflicted between the Buddhist-aligned faction led by
Dhale and the Marxist faction led by Dhasal. Whereas Dhale was inspired by the Ambedkarite
movement, which incorporated peaceful struggles, demands for constitutional rights, and, most
importantly, Buddhist conversion, Dhasal was inspired by the Communist Party of India
(CPI)—to which he declared open allegiance—and a collective struggle against class and caste
exploitation. These groups contended with each other about which ideological orientation should
dictate the political and emancipatory strategies of the movement, considering that Dhale
believed in the capacity of Buddhist conversion to create a new religious and cultural identity for
Dalits, while Dhasal believed religion had no place in the broader emancipatory struggle.
Marxism was essentially interpreted as a tool to understand how ruling elites retained the caste
system through minor concessions.
There were other issues, however, that also plagued the movement’s long-term success, such as
limited financial resources, social capital, and political support. Arguably, the most important of
these was the fact that the Dalit Panthers could not secure social capital or political support from
Dalits themselves. Their loose, unorganized network operating on a case-by-case basis was
unable to appeal to the Dalit masses or other struggling groups, including Adivasis, the working
class, Naxalites, and Muslims. The Dalit Panthers’ utopian ideological goals were not followed
by practical, concrete solutions that could actually ensure Dalits their political and social
emancipation from the caste system. Furthermore, without resources to contest police cases filed
against them in court, the threat of police action and retaliation demoralized the entire activist
base, forcing them to operate only in Dalit ghettos until their street presence became trivial.
Many came to view the Dalit Panthers as a frivolous challenge to the political establishment.
The Panthers were overshadowed by a more pragmatic political party known as the Bahujan
Samaj Party (BSP) in 1984. The popular collective term “Bahujan” refers to the “majority mass,”
and it replaced the acclaimed political term “Dalit.” Bahujan represents majority or socially
marginalized communities as opposed to minority or social elites. The Bahujan identity
politically connected deprived caste groups, serving as a union for all marginalized groups under
the leadership of the Dalits. They promoted themselves as the instrument of democratic change,
capitalizing on the idea that political power was accessible to the Dalit population. Their
electoral victory in Uttar Pradesh showcased that Dalits could pursue their struggle for equality
within mainstream politics and did not, in fact, have to use radical measures to further their cause
as the Dalit Panthers insisted. The lack of clear political guidelines ultimately cost the Dalit
Panthers their efforts and revolutionary vision. The Dalit masses believed their matters should be
addressed through electoral democracy by a competent political party within a
liberal-constitutional framework. As a result of internal strife and political repression, Dhasal and
Pawar announced the dissolution of the Dalit Panthers on March 7, 1977.Scholars’ opinions differ widely on the legacy of the Dalit Panthers movement, with some
arguing that it was short-lived and others arguing that it altered the political imagination of the
Dalit collective. One important way in which the Dalit Panthers’ influence has carried on is
perhaps through the Communist Party of India (Marxist). While the Marxist-Leninist party in
India influenced the Dalit Panthers rather than the other way around, the two groups were
inextricably intertwined through a collective struggle against class and caste exploitation. In
2013, the general secretary of the party, Prakash Karat, highlighted how neoliberal economic
policies like privatization were causing landlessness among Dalits and that effective land reforms
were needed for Dalit emancipation. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has also strive to
change its social composition by inducting people belonging to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled
Tribes. The socialist undertones of the Dalit Panthers’ ideology continue to live on through this
major political party, which holds a notable regional presence in several states.
In historical perspective, while the Dalit Panthers were short-lived and fractured by internal
ideological divides, their impact on the Dalit political consciousness remains profound. By
drawing direct inspiration from the Black Power movement in Oakland and translating its radical
self-defense and anti-establishment ethos into the alleys of Mumbai, the Panthers radically
disrupted the passive political status quo of 1970s India. They proved that marginalized
communities across the globe share a common thread in their struggles for dignity and social
justice. Though pragmatic electoral politics eventually overshadowed their revolutionary
militancy, the Dalit Panthers successfully shifted the boundaries of Dalit art, literature, and
resistance, leaving behind an indelible blueprint for cross-border solidarity and radical
emancipation that continues to resonate today.