This is the second part of my views (a sort of commentary) on the controversial Manu Smriti. No one has the authority to criticize or appreciate it unless one reads it in full. But politicians show them as half baked fellows when they make comments without reading it in full. This second part has more interesting tit bits from the smriti.

Manu Smriti, the Hindu Law Book, is the oldest law book in the world. It is older than Hammurabi’s law book. I have given the details for my dating in this book. Manu Smritis is not followed anywhere in India now or earlier. But all ancient Tamil and Sanskrit authors have praised Manu Neeti (Manu’s Justice). Though we have more than 20 Hindu law books, Manu being the first, everyone praised it as a model book.

Published by Advaita Ashrama, a publication house of Ramakrishna Math, Belur Math, this is Volume 6 of the nine volume series constituting 'The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda'. In these volumes we have not only a gospel to the world at large, but also, to its own children, the Charter of the Hindu faith. For the first time in history, Hinduism itself forms here the subject of generalization of a Hindu mind of the highest order. What Hinduism had needed was the organizing and consolidating of its own idea, a rock where she could lie at anchor, and an authoritative utterance in which she might recognise herself. What the world had needed was a faith that had no fear of truth. Both are found in the words and writings of Swami Vivekananda. It is the latest gospel of a modern Prophet of religion and spirituality to the mankind.

'Manu was seated, when the great seers came up to him: "Please, Lord, tell us the Laws of all the social classes, as well as of those born in between..."' The Law Code of Manu is the most authoritative and the best-known legal text of ancient India. Famous for two thousand years it still generates controversy, with Manu's verses being cited in support of the oppression of women and members of the lower castes. A seminal Hindu text, the Law Code isimportant for its classic description of so many social institutions that have come to be identified with Indian society. It deals with the relationships between social and ethnic groups, between men and women, the organization of the state and the judicial system, reincarnation, the workings ofkarma, and all aspects of the law.Patrick Olivelle's lucid translation is the first to be based on his critically edited text, and it incorporates the most recent scholarship on ancient Indian history, law, society, and religion.

“What the Communist Manifesto is to the capitalist world, Annihilation of Caste is to India.” —Anand Teltumbde, author of The Persistence of Caste The classic work of Indian Dalit politics, reframed with an extensive introduction by Arundathi Roy B.R. Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste is one of the most important, yet neglected, works of political writing from India. Written in 1936, it is an audacious denunciation of Hinduism and its caste system. Ambedkar – a figure like W.E.B. Du Bois – offers a scholarly critique of Hindu scriptures, scriptures that sanction a rigidly hierarchical and iniquitous social system. The world’s best-known Hindu, Mahatma Gandhi, responded publicly to the provocation. The hatchet was never buried. Arundhati Roy introduces this extensively annotated edition of Annihilation of Caste in “The Doctor and the Saint,” examining the persistence of caste in modern India, and how the conflict between Ambedkar and Gandhi continues to resonate. Roy takes us to the beginning of Gandhi’s political career in South Africa, where his views on race, caste and imperialism were shaped. She tracks Ambedkar’s emergence as a major political figure in the national movement, and shows how his scholarship and intelligence illuminated a political struggle beset by sectarianism and obscurantism. Roy breathes new life into Ambedkar’s anti-caste utopia, and says that without a Dalit revolution, India will continue to be hobbled by systemic inequality.