Manusmriti found a mention in unwelcome terms in Parliament on December 14, 2024. Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in Parliament, Rahul Gandhi, said that Manusmriti permitted rapists to roam free and lock down the victim and her family members.
We are not going into the political background of the utterance. We focus specifically on the utterance for two reasons: One, in a bid to earn brownie points among their constituency politicians tend to decontextualise certain things; Two, we are not into day-to-day politics. Our concern is that the misrepresentation and false information presented about Manusmriti should be corrected, because it affects the majority of this country.
In part, could this be a problem of translation? The fact remains that all those who oppose Manusmriti have, by and large, read (if at all) translations of the ancient texts. Not many in India today know Sanskrit to a level where they can read and interpret the ancient texts in all their completeness, nuances and be also able to express their ideas in the same language.
Even the Westerners, who take lot of undue credit of having done great service to Sanskrit by coming up with translations of the ancient texts, agree that there have been serious mistakes.
For instance, Patrick Olivelle, credited with a 2005 translation of Manusmriti published by the Oxford University Press, states the concerns in postmodern scholarship about the presumed authenticity and reliability of Manusmriti manuscripts. He writes, “The Manusmriti was the first Indian legal text introduced to the Western world through the translation of Sir William Jones in 1794. All the editions of the Manusmriti, except for Jolly’s, reproduce the text as found in the Calcutta manuscript containing the commentary of Kulluka. I have called this the ‘Vulgate version’. It was Kulluka’s version that has been translated repeatedly: Jones (1794), Burnell (1884), Buhler (1886), and Doniger (1991). The belief in the authenticity of Kulluka’s text was openly articulated by Burnell (1884, xxix): ‘There is then no doubt that the textus receptus, viz., that of Kulluka Bhatta, as adopted in India and by European scholars are very near on the whole to the original text.’”[1]
Other scholars point to the inconsistencies and have questioned the authenticity of verses, and the extent to which verses were changed, inserted or interpolated into the original, at a later date. Jai B P Sinha, author of Psycho-Social Analysis of the Indian Mindset [2014], for example, states that less than half, or only 1,214 of the 2,685 verses in Manusmriti, may be authentic. Further, the verses are internally inconsistent. “Verses such as 3.55-3.62 of Manusmriti, for example, glorify the position of women, while verses such as 9.3 and 9.17 do the opposite.”[2] Other passages found in Manusmriti, such as those relating to Ganesha, are modern-era insertions and forgeries.
One of the fundamental issues while examining Manusmriti lies unanswered: The British colonial officials (mostly it was them who undertook the earliest translations) viewed it as a code of law, rather than a commentary on law and morals.
A painstaking and detailed work on identifying the flaws within the existing Manusmriti text has been done by Dr. Surendra Kumar, whose work has been published as “Vishuddha Manusmriti”, whose first edition was published in 1981. The work was based on the earlier work on the same issue by Maharishi Dayanand Saraswati. In this, Prof Kumar has pointed out the verses that are inserted, interpolated on very logical grounds, among other things, like: Flow of topic (If one is talking about, say, the kind of marriage, one cannot jump to talking about which varna should/ should not marry with which varna); Does the text fall within the overall world view of what Manu had to say (for instance, if Manu says at one place that a marriage should not be based on financial transaction, then, it is not possible that he would provide for the same at another place, even without slightest justification); Language of the Sanskrit text. When we read the work and the verses, we realise how things begin in falling in one place and sound a like a coherent work.
Also, the language of Manusmriti is such that it is not prescriptive. It just says what all exists in a society, and what are best things/ practices that could be picked (or are worthy of following). For instance, he says there are eight types of marriages, four of which are desirable, and the other four are not. And, even among those four, the last one is considered to be the worst of the worst. Thus, to even call it legal, or law, is to miss the woods for the trees. Essentially, the problem with the scholars is that they blur the lines between a normative and a prescriptive text, while analysing crucially important ancient texts of Bharat, like Manusmriti, or Arthashastra.
Coming to the issue of whether Manusmriti absolves rapists and forces victims to remain confined within their homes, this is what Vishuddha Manusmriti mentions. In Chapter three, of all the eight types of marriages (vivaaha), the worst is the Pishaacha Vivaaha. Talking about its attributes, the Manusmriti says:
सुप्तां मत्तां प्रमत्तां वा रहो यत्रोपगच्छति ।
स पापिष्ठा विवाहनां पैशाचश्चाष्टमोधमः ॥ 3.34
(from Vishuddha Manusmriti)
(Meaning: The one establishing physical relations with a woman who is alone, in a secluded place, sleeping, unconscious either due to intoxication or some other reason, and not in a position to take care for herself, performs the worst act and the biggest sin).
“Pishaacha” itself is described as the one who eats raw flesh and blood, is violent, devilish, incestuous, is of bad sanskaras, base, beastly and has a hateful behaviour. If one cares to note, the above mentioned verse is clearly talking about rape—and it does not condone the rapist.
Of course, worse things have been inflicted on women in this era in the West and other central Asian places, or by the people belonging to those regions but ruling in India; although, they claim to have liberated women and granted them equality. But that can be taken up in another article.
There are many other verses in Manusmriti that reinforce the view—that women are not be violated. But we are sure the “Manusmriti-is-bad-politicians” will not have the time for them. Hence, to say that Manusmriti absolves the rapists is to tell a blatant lie.
The problem with the likes of Rahul Gandhi and others of his ilk is that they have built their political fortunes over decades, nay centuries, by criticising Manusmriti, without even making an earnest effort to understand what it says, and in what context. It would, therefore, be naïve to expect any better from the politicians concerned.
However, one should underline the fact that Parliamentarians should not use their privilege as a licence to say things that are not only far-removed from the fact, but also denigrating to an entire community.
–Prashant Pandey & Yamini
[1] Olivelle, Patrick. Manu’s Code of Law, OUP, 2005. (As quoted in an article “Manusmriti: A Critical Analysis” by Satarupa Sarkar, IJHSSS (2022). pp 255-260)
[2] Sinha, Jai B P. Psycho-Social Analysis of the Indian Mindset, 2014. p 5.
