Academic literature on the topic 'Olitical science'

In the Lotus Sutra (the first Sutra introduced into China and Vietnam from India), the Buddha is described as the most respected and loved creature who walked on two feet. This was precisely the reason why Dalits in India have started the Navayana Buddhism or the Neo- Buddhist movement which is a very socially and politically engaged form of Buddhism. For Dalits, whose material circumstances were very different from the ainstream upper castes, the motivation always remained: to learn about suffering and to reach its end, in each person‘s life and in society. Many of them have turned to Dhamma in response to the Buddha‘s central message about suffering and the end of suffering. Previously lower-caste Hindus, the Indian Buddhists in Nagpur converted under the olitical influence of Babasaheb Ambedkar, the author of India‘s constitution, to denounce caste oppression. They became Buddhist for political and spiritual reasons, and today, the implications of their actions continue to unfold in many ways. Their belief in the four seals of Buddhism – All compounded things are impermanent, All emotions are the pain, All things have no inherent existence and Nirvana is beyond concepts, have made them renounce the atrocities and injustice of Hindu savarnas which were carried on since last many centuries. It is well known that Buddha began his investigation into the mysteries of life by his acute awareness of the painful aspects of his immediate experiences. His encounter with the disease, old age, death, and its sorrowful effects were instrumental in developing a whole philosophy based on the fact of suffering (duḥkha).In his book The Buddha and His Dhamma, Dr. Ambedkar has proposed his concept of Navaya Buddhism which was not very similar to the mainstream traditional Buddhism. His idea was more to discard the practices of karma, rebirth in an afterlife, or related rituals and to use religion in terms of class struggle and social equality. He adopts science, activism, and social reform as a form of Engaged Buddhism. Many critics have identified this phenomenon as a synthesis of the ideas of modern Karl Marx into the structure of ideas by the ancient Buddha. ―Whenever the ethical or moral value of activities or conditions is questioned, the value of religion is involved; and all deep-stirring experiences invariably compel a reconsideration of the most fundamental ideas, whether they are explicitly religious or not.‖ (Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics). This paper tries to discuss the role of Buddhism in Modern Indian social problematic reference to context.