Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders have questioned the remarks made by the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on the Manusmriti and women’s rights. BJP MP Nishikant Dubey quoted two verses from the text that emphasise respect for women, while Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma accused Mr. Gandhi of using women’s empowerment as a pretext to target Hinduism.

Mr. Sarma also asked how often the Congress leader had spoken against what he described as “patriarchal and medieval practices that persist under Sharia”.

During an interaction with female students in Maharashtra on August 22, 2026, Mr. Gandhi spoke against the “Manusmriti mindset”, called on students to “smash patriarchy”, and said women belonged to themselves, not to their fathers, husbands or sons.

On social media platform X, the Congress party shared a photograph of him with an attributed quote: “The Manusmriti states that a woman must never be independent. But I believe women should be independent. You may have relationships with your father, brother, husband, or son, but you do not belong to them. You belong to yourself.”

Responding to the post the same day, Mr. Dubey tagged a message to Mr. Gandhi’s X handle, saying: “Reading the Manusmriti may not be possible for you, @RahulGandhi ji. This is a shloka from the Manusmriti; read, understand, and speak. Because of the English language, do you know nothing about India’s Vedas, Puranas, scriptures, Ramayana, and Mahabharata?”

Mr. Dubey mentioned two verses from the Manusmriti, along with translations that read: “Where women are respected and worshipped, the gods reside; where they are not respected, all work and noble deeds bring no results.”

On Monday (August 24, 2026), Mr. Sarma posted on X: “Rahul Gandhi is no champion of women’s rights. He is simply a Hindu baiter, using the cause of women’s empowerment as a convenient smokescreen to target and discredit Hindu Dharma.”

“Consider this: how many times has he spoken with the same outrage against patriarchal and medieval practices that persist under Sharia? Never. While Sharia is foundational to Islamic jurisprudence, Manusmriti has no comparable scriptural authority in Hindu Dharma. It is not even a universally binding code for Hindus,” Mr. Sarma said.

“Yet ask yourself: how many times does Rahul Gandhi attack the Manusmriti, and how many times does he attack Sharia with the same fervour? The enduring strength of Hinduism lies in its unique ability to evolve, reform and adapt with time – as it has for millennia and as it will for eternity,” he said.

“Every Hindu must therefore ask: what is Rahul Gandhi’s real intent – championing women’s rights, or using them as a pretext to malign Hindu Dharma? Cong[ress] rhetoric on women’s rights rings hollow when measured against its own record. They betrayed our mothers and sisters by reversing the effect of the Shah Bano judgment,” Mr. Sarma added.

Stating that the Congress opposed the law against ‘Triple Talaq’, he alleged that just to “cling to power in Karnataka”, Mr. Gandhi had ensured “not a single woman found a place in the State Cabinet”.

“So here is a simple challenge to Rahul Gandhi: If women’s equality truly comes before politics, will he unequivocally support a Uniform Civil Code that guarantees equal rights irrespective of religion? Or will his idea of ‘women’s rights’ continue to begin and end with attacking Hinduism?” Mr. Sarma said.