Namdeo Laxman Dhasal

Born: 15 February 1949

Died: 15 January 2014

He was a Marathi poet, writer and Dalit activist from Maharashtra, India.
He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1999 and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Sahitya Akademi in 2004.
In 2001, he made a presentation at the first Berlin International Literature Festival.
In 1982, cracks began to appear in the Dalit Panther movement.
Ideological disputes began to eclipse the common goal of liberation.
He wanted to engender a mass movement and widen the term Dalit to include all oppressed people, but the majority of his comrades insisted on maintaining the exclusivity of their organization.
His illness and alcoholism overshadowed the following years, during which he wrote very little.
In the 1990s, he once again became politically active.
He held national office in the Indian Republican Party, which was formed by the merger of all Dalit parties.
The Dalit literature tradition is an old one, though the term was introduced only in 1958.
He was greatly inspired by the work of Baburao Bagul, who employed photographic realism to draw attention to the circumstances which those deprived of their rights from birth have to endure.
His poems broke away from stylistic conventions.
He included in his poetry many words and expressions which only the Dalits normally used.
In Golpitha, for instance, he adapted his language to that of the red-light district, which shocked middle-class readers.