The Manav Dharma Sabha was a major socio-cultural reform established by Mehtaji Durgaram Manchharam on 22nd June, 1844. It proved to be a road-map for all other reforms in Surat and especially in the state of Gujarat.
Other prominent members of the group were Dadoba Panderung Tarkhad, Dinmani Shankar, Dalpatram Bhagubai and Damodar Das.
Durgaram and his friends rejected “the existence of ghosts, their exorcism by means of incantations, the evils of early marriage and the bar against remarriage of high caste Hindu widows”.
The main cause behind the foundation of the Sabha was the fi re against the conversion of a Parsi student to Christianity.
What is Manav Dharma Sabha