Gandhi censored the testimonial voice of untouchables in Anand’s novel

Evidence

In his speech at the Suppressed Classes Conference in Ahmedabad on 13 April 1921, reported in Young India on 27 April 1921 and 4 May 1921 (reproduced in CWMG 23, 41–7), Gandhi discussed Uka at length for the first time (42). Bakha, the main protagonist in Mulk Raj Anand’s iconic novel Untouchable (1935), is said to be inspired by Uka. According to the researcher Lingaraja Gandhi (2004), Anand showed his manuscript to Gandhi, who suggested changes. Anand says: “I read my novel to Gandhiji, and he suggested that I should cut down more than a hundred pages, especially those passages in which Bakha seemed to be thinking and dreaming and brooding like a Bloomsbury intellectual.” Lingaraja Gandhi further says: “Anand had provided long and flowery speeches to Bakha in his draft. Gandhi instructed Anand that untouchables don’t speak that way: in fact, they hardly speak. The novel underwent metamorphosis under the tutelage of Gandhi.” — Ambedkar, B R, Annihilation of Caste_ The Annotated…, 545

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s broader interest in Ambedkar’s critique of Gandhi and caste; the fiction-censoring detail parallels how Gandhi framed untouchables in real life.
• SEED: An essay angle on how reform movements police the self-representation of the oppressed they claim to champion — Gandhi editing Anand’s untouchable protagonist’s speech.