ThePrint ·
Rahul’s position on Manusmriti isn’t a political invention. Debate goes back to Constituent Assembly
Long before today’s debates over the Manusmriti, the Constitution makers fought over its place in India’s new legal order with even Dr BR Ambedkar strategically employing it to argue for women's rights.
New Delhi: Two days before the Constitution was adopted by the Constituent Assembly on 26 November 1949, social reformer and Congress leader Keshavrao Jedhe congratulated Dr B.R. Ambedkar and his colleagues for framing the country’s new Constitution. But he had a concern.
“Some members (of the Assembly) while congratulating Dr Ambedkar have called him the present Manu. I am certain that he would not like this appellation. I know he hates Manu who has created four castes, the lowest of which is the untouchable class,” Jedhe said.
Recalling Ambedkar’s public burning of the Manusmriti during the Mahad Satyagraha in 1927, Jedhe asserted that Ambedkar had instead framed the ‘Bhim Smriti’—the Constitution of India.
