128 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
It is for this that Manu imposed these disabilities upon women and crippled them permanently. Those who doubt this might well consider the following injunctions contained in Manu Smriti —
V. 88. Funeral rites and obsequies which are performed on the death of a person shall be withdrawn (i.e, shall not be performed ) from those who are born out of intermixture, from those who are addicted to asceticism and from those who have ended their lives by committing suicide.
V. 89. They shall also be withdrawn from women who have joined a heretic sect, who have too freely. who have injured a child in their womb or their husband and those who drink wine.
This injunction is among others aimed at (1) those who are addicted to asceticism and (2) women who have joined a heretic sect. In this injuction asceticism refers to Parivrajakas i.e. those who have abandoned their homes and taken to Sannyas and, in referring to a heretic sect, there is no doubt that Manu has in mind the Buddhist religion. It is therefore clear that when Manu declares that no funeral rites and obsequies shall be performed, for an ascetic or a woman who has joined a heretic sect, what Manu does is to prohibit performance of funeral rites and obsequies of a member of a family-whether male or female-who has joined the Buddha’s religion. In other words he wants them to be treated as though they were disaffiliated and ho longer belonged to the family. Manu was the greatest opponent of the Buddhist religion. This is the secret of the many inequities which he heaped upon women. For he knew that if the home is to be protected against the invasion of Buddhism it is the woman who must be put under restraint. And he did it. All responsibility for the decline and fall of woman in India must be fastened upon Manu and not upon the Buddha.
In the compass of a few pages I have endeavoured to present the story of the Rise and fall of the Hindu woman. I have also endeavoured to offer an explanation as to who was the author of their fall and why he brought it about. I hope that the