(a) Discuss the views of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar regarding caste-discrimination in Indian society. What are the measures suggested by…

Justice, human dignity, and fundamental rights require interrogating both historical social hierarchies and the theoretical frameworks that justify them.

Ambedkar on Caste Discrimination and Measures for Its Elimination

Dr. B.R. Ambedkar conceptualized the caste system not merely as a division of labour, but as a rigid "division of labourers" arranged in an ascending scale of reverence and a descending scale of contempt. This system of "graded inequality" prevents the formation of common social consciousness, as every caste takes pride in being superior to the one beneath it, precluding united action against oppression. Ambedkar rejected the apologist view that caste is an innocent social mechanism, arguing in Annihilation of Caste that it derives its immutable authority from sacred Hindu scriptures like the Manusmriti. Caste discrimination is thus a religiously sanctioned denial of liberty, equality, and fraternity.

To eliminate caste, Ambedkar proposed a multi-pronged strategy. First, he advocated the destruction of the divine sanctity of the shastras, arguing that genuine reform requires dynamiting the religious scriptures that sanctify caste. Second, at the social level, he identified inter-caste marriage as the only real solvent of caste consciousness, as fusion of blood alone creates the feeling of kith and kin. Third, through legal-constitutional means, he instituted fundamental rights (Articles 14, 15, and the abolition of untouchability under Article 17), alongside reservations in public employment and legislatures to secure political representation. Fourth, he advocated state socialism and economic restructuring to break upper-caste monopoly over land and resources. Finally, recognizing that constitutional morality alone could not eradicate entrenched social prejudice, Ambedkar led the mass conversion to Buddhism (Navayana) in 1956, establishing an alternative spiritual-democratic foundation rooted in prajna (understanding), karuna (compassion), and samata (equality).

Causes of Female Foeticide: Beyond Technological Determinism

Female foeticide in India is not merely the result of a demonic application of technology; technology is merely a facilitative tool that accelerates pre-existing structural misogyny. The primary drivers are deeply entrenched in patriarchal institutions: intense son-preference driven by lineage continuation and funeral rites, the extortionate dowry system, patrilineal property inheritance patterns, and the socio-economic perception of daughters as economic liabilities.

Ultrasound and amniocentesis technologies are ethically neutral instruments. Their conversion into tools of elimination reflects what Amartya Sen terms the phenomenon of "missing women"—where deep-seated anti-female bias manifests as natality inequality. In Martha Nussbaum’s capabilities approach, female foeticide represents the ultimate deprivation of the central capabilities of "life" and "bodily integrity." The weak enforcement of the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act, 1994, combined with commercial medical malpractices, enables this bias. Addressing it demands not just technological surveillance, but systemic social transformation through initiatives like Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, strict inheritance parity, and dismantling patriarchal norms.

Evaluation of Social Contract Theory on Human Rights

Social contract theory offers a vital foundation for human rights by deriving legitimate political authority from the consent of equal individuals. John Rawls modernized this tradition through the "original position" and the "veil of ignorance," demonstrating that rational persons would choose principles securing equal basic liberties and safeguarding the least advantaged.

However, classical contractarianism (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau) suffers from severe structural exclusions. As Carole Pateman demonstrates in The Sexual Contract, the original pact was a patriarchal agreement that relegated women to the private sphere, outside the protection of civil rights. Susan Moller Okin similarly argues that contract theories fail to address gender justice within the family. Furthermore, post-colonial critics highlight that classical contract theory historically excluded colonized peoples, the enslaved, and the propertyless, treating rights as privileges of European propertied males.

Because social contract theory relies on mutual advantage among roughly equal bargaining agents, it struggles to protect vulnerable groups who cannot reciprocate, such as future generations, non-human animals, and persons with severe disabilities. Consequently, contemporary philosophy supplements contractarianism with the human capabilities approach of Sen and Nussbaum, natural rights paradigms, cosmopolitan theories of global justice (such as Thomas Pogge's), and Will Kymlicka’s framework of group-differentiated rights for cultural minorities.

Addressing systemic deprivations requires moving beyond formal contractual reciprocity toward an inclusive ethic of capability, substantive constitutional democracy, and continuous moral reconstruction of society.