Ambedkar Jayanti 2017: Unkown facts about Father of Indian Constitution

Architect of the Indian Constitution and dalit rights activist B R Ambedkar’s126th birth anniversary will be observed today across India. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, popularly known as Babasaheb, was an Indian jurist, economist, politician and social reformer who inspired the Modern Buddhist Movement and campaigned against social discrimination of Dalits, women and labour. He was Independent India's first law minister and the principal architect of the Constitution of India.

PM Narendra Modi paid tributes to venerable Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar on Ambedkar Jayanti. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Nagpur on Friday and inaugurates a series of development projects.

Tributes to venerable Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar on Ambedkar Jayanti. Jai Bhim. अम्बेडकर जयंती के पावन अवसर पर पूज्य बाबासाहेब को नमन। #जयभीम ! pic.twitter.com/XVC0TNtufV

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) April 14, 2017

Know some unknown facts about BR Ambedkar here: 

-BR Ambedkar was the 14th and last child of Ramji Maloji Sakpal, a ranked army officer at the post of Subedar and Bhimabai Murbadkar Sankpal.

-Ambedkar's ancestors had long been in the employment of the British East India Company's army.

-Brahmin teacher, Mahadev Ambedkar, who was fond of him, changed his surname from 'Ambavadekar' to his own surname 'Ambedkar' in school records.

-In 1897, Ambedkar's family moved to Bombay where Ambedkar became the only untouchable enrolled at Elphinstone High School.

-In 1918 he became Professor of Political Economy in the Sydenham College of Commerce and Economics in Mumbai. 

-On 29 August 1947, he was appointed Chairman of the Constitution Drafting Committee, charged by the Assembly to write India's new Constitution

-It was Ambedkar who won Assembly's support for introducing a system of reservations of jobs in the civil services, schools and colleges for members of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes and Other Backward Class, a system akin to affirmative action.

-The Constitution was adopted on 26 November 1949 by the Constituent Assembly.

-Ambedkar resigned from the cabinet in 1951 following the stalling in parliament of his draft of the Hindu Code Bill, he was the first Indian to pursue an Economics doctorate degree abroad. 

-Ambedkar's first wife had died in 1935 following long illness, later he met Dr. Sharada Kabir, a Saraswat Brahmin, whom he married on 15 April 1948