Samajwadi Party MLC and party general secretary Swami Prasad Maurya has stirred another controversy by saying that Hindu dharma is not a religion but a hoax.
Maurya, who had earlier stirred a major controversy with his remarks against some verses of Ramcharitmanas, is once again taking heat for his remarks on Hindu dharma and Brahminism.
Maurya on Monday labelled Hindu dharma “deceitful” and “a hoax”. He posted a video on X (previously Twitter) in which he stated, “The roots of Brahminism are very deep and the reason for all the disparity is also Brahminism. There is no religion called Hindu, Hinduism is just a hoax. There is a conspiracy to trap the Dalits, tribals and backward people of this country by calling the same Brahmin religion as Hindu religion. If there was Hindu religion then tribals would have been respected, Dalits would have been respected, backward people would have been respected but what an irony...”
His remarks sparked a row among social media users, with a section criticising him for “spreading hatred”.
Swami Prasad Maurya had kicked up a controversy in February this year by alleging that certain verses of Ramcharitmanas insulted a large section of society on the basis of caste and demanded that these verses be banned.
He said that humiliation of a caste in the name of religion should be objected to. He added that there were several crore people who had not or did not read Ramcharitmanas. He said it was the British era that gave Dalits the right to read and write and that women got their right to be literate under the British Raj. He went on to say that the Hindu religious text was “all nonsense” and urged the government to erase the objectionable part of Ramcharitmanas or ban the entire book.
Meanwhile, in an apparent damage control exercise, Dimple Yadav, Member of Parliament and wife of SP president Akhilesh Yadav, said “no one is enemy of Sanatan dharma and in 2024 Lok Sabha elections the electorate, irrespective of caste and religion, will vote for the success of opposition alliance INDIA”.
Another SP leader, IP Singh, flayed the statement of Maurya, saying, “He should refrain from making critical comments on religion. He had embraced Buddhism decades ago and this does not give him the right to condemn Sanatan dharma.”
He said Maurya was in the Bharatiya Janata Party and a cabinet minister in Yogi Adityanath government and he never raised religious issues then. Singh counseled Maurya to fight for caste based census, PDA (Pichhada, Dalit, Alpsankhyak) and the students of Other Backward Classes communities who had been denied accommodation in Banaras Hindu University hostel.