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Agra woman held for ‘burning Manusmriti’; she says viral video is 3 years old

The Agra police said that although the controversial video showing the burning of Manusmriti was claimed to have been shot 3 years ago, the matter came to the notice of the police only recently.

2 min readUpdated: Jan 1, 2026 03:28 PM IST

The police have filed a First Information Report (FIR) against her under Section 223 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), which pertains to disobedience of an order duly promulgated by a public servant.

The Agra police on Tuesday arrested a 22-year-old woman in Uttar Pradesh after a video allegedly showing her burning the Manusmriti went viral on December 26.

The woman, identified as Priyanka Varun, a resident of Agra, had claimed that the video in question is nearly three years old and was reposted recently on social media, the police said on Thursday. Varun claimed to be the national president of the Bharatiya Mahila Suraksha Sangh, an NGO that supports women and children with autism.

“We arrested Priyanka Varun on December 30 on charges related to breach of peace. She was produced before the magistrate the same day and was subsequently released on bail,” said B P Giri, station house officer of Shahganj police station.

The SHO said that although the controversial video was claimed to have been shot three years ago, the matter came to the notice of the police only recently, following its circulation on X.

The complainant in the case, Sub-Inspector D M Pandey, stated that the police took cognisance of the matter and initiated legal action in view of the fact that the video showing the burning of Manusmrithi could potentially disturb social harmony and public peace, as several people had protested against the video, claiming that it had hurt their religious faith.

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