Chants of Jai Sri Ram rent the air as deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, the BJP’s face in Maharashtra, garlanded the statue of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar at Samvidhan Chowk in Nagpur, the very place where the Father of the Constitution renounced Hinduism.

In another part of Nagpur, the Maharashtra government, run by an alliance helmed by the BJP, had started a project for the “development and beautification” of Deekshabhoomi, a monument commemorating Ambedkar’s conversion to Buddhism.

Both actions have angered Ambedkarites and marginalised sections in poll-bound Maharashtra who view these as attempts to undermine Babasaheb and also impose the larger Hindutva agenda of the BJP-RSS. Nagpur is where the RSS headquarters is located.

On October 25, hundreds of supporters of Fadnavis shouted “Jai Sri Ram” as
the BJP leader garlanded Ambedkar’s statue before filing his nominations for the South-West Nagpur Assembly constituency.

This was the first time the slogan had been raised at Samvidhan Chowk, a site where people from the marginalised sections stage protests to press for their rights.

The Deekshabhoomi Bachao Sangharsh Samiti (DBSS) and the Samvidhan Nagrik Samiti (SNS) have demanded the registration of an FIR against the BJP workers who raised the slogan. DBSS president Rakesh Dhargave alleged that the BJP workers had damaged the railings around the statue.

“We were not present here when they shouted Jai Sri Ram. It was a deliberate act to create violence. We believe in the ‘Jai Bhim’ slogan, not ‘Jai Sri Ram’. They wanted to insult Babasaheb,” Dhargave said.

In Maharashtra, the Scheduled Castes (SCs) constitute 12 per cent of the population, while in Nagpur city, they make up 21 per cent of the population. Ambedkar converted to Buddhism in Nagpur with five lakh followers on October 14, 1956.

Dhargave said the police were yet to register an FIR on the developments at Samvidhan Chowk.

“The police are now saying the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) will recover the costs from the persons who damaged the railings. The NMC claims the damage is very minor. They are under pressure not to take action. We will move court seeking a direction for the registration of an FIR,” Dhargave said.

Gobind Waghmare, the president of the SNS, said Ambedkar had written critical essays on the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. The Maharashtra government has published the writings of Ambedkar, including these essays, in a compilation titled Riddles in Hinduism.

“Fadnavis has come here many times in the past. They never gave the ‘Jai Sri Ram’ slogan. We protested after the incident. Fadnavis has not issued any clarification yet. He must tender an apology,” Waghmare said.

Ketan Pathak, the media adviser to Fadnavis, denied that the slogan had been chanted at Samvidhan Chowk, or that the railing around the railings around the statue had been damaged.

Dhargave linked the October 25 incident to the now-stalled project to “develop and beautify” the Deekshabhoomi monument, considered sacred by Buddhists. The Nagpur Metropolitan Region Development Authority (NMRDA) had planned to renovate the gates, plaster the base structure of Deekshabhoomi and construct an underground parking lot and an open-air theatre at a cost of ₹200 crore.

When the underground parking area was being built, several Ambedkerite groups, including the DBSS, expressed concern about the safety of the Deekshabhoomi dome. On July 1, thousands of people staged protests, after which the project was abandoned as the BJP government feared it might snowball into a national issue. The huge pit that had been dug has been filled with soil.

On October 14 every year, lakhs of Buddhists and people from other communities throng Deekshabhoomi to mark Ambedkar’s conversion to Buddhism.

Dhargave alleged that the BJP and the RSS, which is celebrating its 100th year in 2025, do not want such massive support for Buddhism in Nagpur. “So they had started the development project to hinder the congregation of devotees,” he said.

“Our main concern was that the project would have affected the monument in the long term. The RSS wants a Hindu Rashtra and Buddhism is an obstacle to this. They want to slowly damage Deekshabhoomi,” Dhargave said.

• Maharashtra votes on November 20