MODULE 2: PRESENT-DAY INDIA (2)
According to the Census
of India l99l, the percentage breakdown of the various "world" religions
in India was as follows:
The category "Other" included Parsis (7l,630 in l98l), Jews (5,6l8 in l98l),
tribal traditions (roughly 500,000 in l98l), and so forth. Projecting
the percentages above on the population of India in the recent Census of
India l99l (namely, 843,930,86l or about 840,000,000), a reasonable rough
estimate of membership in various "world" religion groupings would be the
following: Hindus - 700,000,000, Muslims - l00,000,000, Christians - 20,000,000,
Sikhs - l6,000,000, Buddhists - 6,000,000, Jains - 3,000,000, Other - 4,000,000.
Hindus.
BACK TO TOP
The so-called "Hindu" percentage is something of a problem, since it
includes Scheduled Castes ("untouchables") and Scheduled Tribes ("tribals")
that together account for some 23.5% of the total population.
If one were to assume that many low-status groups would hesitate or prefer
not to identify themselves with the category "Hindu," this could lower
the "Hindu" total to as low as 500,000,000, or, in other words, not much
more than 60% or 62% of the population. If one then combined
the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes with the other minority religious
groups (Muslim, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain and Other), the non-Hindu
or minority percentage would be 38% to 40%. Much depends, of course, on
precisely what is meant by the term "Hindu."
By way of an overall approximation, it can be said that about two-thirds
of all Hindus are Vaishnavas (followers of Vishnu or one of his incarnations
as Krishna or Rama); about one-third would be Shaivas (followers of Shiva)
or devotees of the goddess (Shakta-s). These traditions are found
throughout India, but it is probably fair to say that Vaishnava traditions
(especially the traditions of Rama and Krishna) are particularly strong
in the northern Hindi Heartland region of North Central India as well as
in the North East region around the State of Bengal and the Western Region
of Gujarat and Maharashtra. Shaiva traditions are particularly
strong in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka in the Southern region but also in Kashmir
in the far North West region and in the North East region in and around
Bengal.
There are several hundred monastic orders within the various Hindu traditions,
and estimates run from l million to as many as l5 million regarding the
number of persons involved in the "professional religious" or monastic
life in India. The most famous monastic order is the Dashanami (literally
meaning "the ten-named" or, in other words, an order with "ten named subdivisions"),
founded by the great Vedantin philosopher, Shankara, probably some time
in the eighth century of the Common Era and continuing down to the present,
with centers in all the major regions of present-day India, the membership
of which is overwhelmingly high-caste Brahmin. In addition, there
are numerous other "schools" or "orders" belonging to the various Vaishnava
and Shaiva groups all around India, as well as various independent monastic
groups and a great variety of individual itinerant sadhus and sadhvis ("holy
persons").
In addition to these traditional forms of Hindu spirituality, there
are also many varieties of what can be called reformist and revisionist
Neo-Hindu religious groups whose emergence in the nineteenth and twentieth
century largely represent Hindu India's reaction to western civilization,
seculariztion, modernization and Christian missionary efforts.
The anthropologist, Agehananda Bharati, has usefully distinguished three
levels of Hindu religion: (a) "village Hinduism" made up of "grassroots,"
"little tradition" Hindu spirituality, characterized by belief in local
demons and spirits, eccentric varieties of magico-religious practices,
shamanistic traditions of ecstatic experience, but with some observance
of all-India mainline Hindu practices and festivals; (b) literate or scripture-based
"Sanskrit, Vedic Hinduism," also "grassroots" Hindu spirituality but of
a learned, "great tradition" variety, represented by Brahmin priests, pandits
(traditionally trained scholars), itinerant ascetics or monastic practitioners;
and, finally, (c) the"renaissance Hinduism" or Neo-Hinduism of what Bharati
calls the "urban alienate," or, in other words, a portion of the new urban
middle class, characterized by the modernized, reformed and often westernized
Hindu spirituality of Gurus such as Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, Satya Sai
Baba and many others. Bharati's levels, of course, are not to be taken
as hard scientific categories based on survey research. They are,
rather, a rough heuristic overview of some of the more obvious types of
Hindu social reality.
Assuming, as mentioned above, that the category of "Hindu" includes
at least about 500,000,000 (or, in other words, some 60% to 62% of the
total population and not including Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes
as "Hindu"), possibly as many as 3% to 5% could be included in the category
of "renaissance Hinduism" or Neo-Hinduism (or, in other words, between
l5 and 25 million, most of whom come from the "forward" castes and many
of whom are English-speaking); possibly l3% to l5% could be included
in the category of literate, scriptural "Sanskrit or Vedic Hinduism" (or,
in other words, between 65 and 75 million, and again largely made up of
the higher or "forward" castes, with possibly some few knowing English
but with most speaking a modern, regional vernacular such as Hindi, Bengali,
Gujarati, and so forth); and the remainder could be included in the category
of "village Hinduism" ( or, in other words, just over 400 million and largely
belonging to the Other Backward Classes or other low-status persons).
These, of course, are only rough approximations. Hindus represent
a majority in almost all States and Union Territories with the exception
of the State of Jammu and Kashmir, in which Muslims represent a two-thirds
majority, the State of Punjab, in which the majority (60%) is Sikh, and
the tribal States of Nagaland and Meghalaya, in which there are majorities
(80% and 53% respectively) of (largely Protestant) Christians.
Muslims. BACK
TO TOP
Muslims have been involved in the life of the subcontinent as far back
as the seventh century of the Common Era, and even during the long centuries
of Muslim rule (first by the Turko-Afghan Muslims of the Delhi Sultanate,
l206-l526, and later by the migrant Iranians and Persianized Afghans and
Turks of the Mughal period, l526-l757), the Muslim population was never
more than a minority. Even at the time of Partition in l947, only
24% of the population was Muslim. After Partition, when the Muslim
populations of Punjab and Bengal were split off from India (to form Pakistan)
only the State of Jammu and Kashmir continued to have a majority Muslim
population. Moreover, the social and cultural make-up of Muslims in India
has always been exceedingly diverse, with only a small elite ruling in
North Central India and another small elite in what is now Andhra, the
remainder of the community being made up of urban artisan groups, petty
traders, and peasant agrarian communities. The largest concentrations
of Muslims are in Assam (24%),West Bengal (2l.5%), Kerala (2l.3%), Uttar
Pradesh (l5.9%), Bihar (l4.l%), Karnataka (ll%) and Andhra Pradesh (8.5%).
Moreover, Muslims tend to be concentrated in urban areas--for example,
Hyderabad (38%), Lucknow (29%), Varanasi (26%), Allahabad (24%), Kanpur
(20%) and concentrations above the national average in Calcutta, Bombay,
Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Agra, Jaipur, Indore and Jabalpur. Roughly two-thirds
of all Muslims in India are followers of Sunni Islam (approximately 65
million); one-third follow Shi'a Islam (about 35 million). There
is also a small community (less than 200,000) of the heretical Ahmadiyas
(a dissident Shi'a group in the Punjab region, founded in l889, with a
following also in Pakistan as well as outside the subcontinent in Africa
and the United States).
Christians. BACK
TO TOP
Christian traditions have been present in India since at least the
sixth century of the Common Era and possibly even earlier. The Malabar
Christian community (also called the "Thomas Christian" community) in Kerala
and Tamil Nadu claims to have been founded by the Apostle Thomas who purportedly
was martyred in what is now Madras in 52 of the Common Era. This
is probably a legendary account, but there is some evidence that Christian
communities may have been present in south India by the middle of the fourth
century, and certainly by the middle of the sixth century. These early
Christian communities were of the Orthodox Syrian tradition with ties to
both Nestorian and Monophysite traditions in the region of Antioch in Syria.
Roman Catholicism came to India with the coming of the Portugese in l498
and the mission work of the Jesuits, St. Francis Xavier (l506-l552), Robert
de Nobili (l577-l656) et al., largely in south India. Protestant
missionary work first began with Danish Lutherans at the beginning of the
eighteenth century and gained great momentum eventually at the end of the
eighteenth century and thereafter with the coming of the Baptist, William
Carey, to the Danish settlement at Serampore near Calcutta in l793.
Among the estimated 20 million Christians in India, nearly half (over
9 million) are Roman Catholic and follow either the reformed Roman rite
or the Syro-Malabar rite (a Syriac liturgy, permitted by Rome, for those
in the Orthodox Syrian tradition who have become converted or are in communion
with Rome). Nearly 8 million Christians are Protestant, with many belonging
either to the united Church of North India (a union of Congregationalists,
Presbyterians, Anglicans, Methodists, Baptists and Disciples of Christ
dating from l970, and with a membership numbering about 500,000) or to
the united Church of South India (a union of Anglicans, Methodists, Presbyterians,
Congregationalists and Dutch Reformed, dating from l947, and with a membership
of l,500,000). Both united Churches are in communion with the
Mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar (numbering about one million members),
an autonomous Orthodox group that broke away from Syrian Orthodox
Church in the nineteenth century. The Syrian Orthodox Church itself
or the "Thomas Christian" community numbers about l,500,000. In addition
to these main groups, there are numerous independent Baptist, Lutheran,
Methodist, Anglican and Pentecostal churches in India. The majority
of all Christians (some 60%) in India are to be found in the southern States
of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. As mentioned above, they
also represent majority populations in the small tribal States of Nagaland
and Meghalaya. They are also found in the State of Goa (3l%), the
State of Manipur (26%) and in the Union Territories of the Andaman and
Nicobar Islands (26%). For the most part, Indian Christians derive
from the lower classes and castes, many from tribal and untouchable groups.
Sikhs. BACK
TO TOP
The Sikh tradition is a relatively recent addition to India's potpourri
of religious traditions. Founded in the North-West region (the Punjab
area) by Guru Nanak (l469-l539) at the beginning of the sixteenth century
as an interesting blend of both Hindu devotionalism and Muslim (mainly
Sufi) piety, it attained a more distinctive definition at the time of its
final or tenth successor-guru, namely, Guru Gobind Singh (l666-l708),
who (a) proclaimed that the living tradition of Gurus was to be replaced
by the Sikh holy book, the "Adi Granth" or Guru Granth Sahib ("Book of
the Lord"), (b) introduced the notion of the "Khalsa" (the "pure" community),
a sacred, militant fraternity into which committed followers were initiated
by means of a kind of baptismal ritual (called amrit-dhari or "taking the
nectar"), and (c) required those who had been baptized to take a new surname,"Singh"
or "lion", and to observe the symbolic "five K's" (panj-pakke), namely,
kes (unshorn hair), kangha (comb), kara (steel bangle), kirpan (dagger)
and kacch (special cloth shorts or underwear). Thereafter those who had
taken "baptism" and become part of the Khalsa came to be known as kes-dhari
("wearing unshorn hair"), while those who had not taken baptism and not
joined the Khalsa were referred to as sahaj-dhari or "non-Khalsa Sikhs"
or simply the "not yet committed." Much of the religious sentiment
of the Sikhs closely parallels Hindu devotional piety, but it resembles
Islam in its clear monotheism and its rejection of any representation of
the deity. The Sikhs also reject many aspects of the traditional
caste system, although caste-groupings do play a role in Sikh politics
and religion--for example, urban-based "forward" caste Khatris in rivalry
with rural-based and "forward" caste Jats, or again, low-caste or "scheduled
caste" Sikhs who seek entitlement benefits along with Hindu "scheduled
castes," and so forth.
The Sikh tradition is probably closer overall to Hindu traditions than
to Muslim traditions, and it is not unusual for Hindus to think of the
Sikh tradition as a subset of Hindu traditions. Moreover, intermarriage
is often allowed between Sikh and Hindu families, something that would
never occur between Hindus and Muslims. At the same time, however, it is
generally the case that Sikhs, especially the kes-dharis but probably most
others in the community as well, since before independence in l947,
have clearly wanted to differentiate Sikh traditions from Hindu traditions,
both in terms of politics and in terms of religion. The Sikhs attained
a measure of political independence in l966 when the two new States of
Haryana and Punjab were formed, the former of which is a largely Hindu,
Hindi-speaking part of the southeastern portion of the old Punjab region
and the latter of which is a largely Sikh, Punjabi-speaking part of the
northwestern portion of the old Punjab region. The new State
of Punjab has a majority Sikh population of 60% (roughly l2 million) with
its distinctive regional language of Punjabi (and even a distinctive script
known as Gurmukhi or "language of the Gurus"), and minority Hindu and Muslim
populations of 38% and l% respectively. There are many Sikhs, however,
outside the State of Punjab. As many as 4 million live in the States
of Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and the Union Territory of Delhi,
and there is a sizable Sikh "diaspora" outside of India in Canada, the
United States, Great Britain and West Germany.
Buddhists. BACK
TO TOP
The Buddhist tradition, of course, is one of the oldest non-Hindu
or non-brahmanical religious traditions in India dating back to the time
of its founder, Gautama (ca., 563-483 B.C.E.), in the North Central region
of the Gangetic Plain in what is now Bihar and the foothills of the Himalayas
in the southern part of Nepal. The Buddha rejected Vedic ritualism
and the authority of Brahmin priests and, instead, taught a moderate "middle
way" of disciplined meditation. Buddhist traditions have a
rich history on the Indian subcontinent, ranging from its early or Theravada
("tradition of the elders") forms which helped in providing the political
and religious ideology of dharma ("law," "righteousness," "doctrine") for
India's first period of imperial unification under the Mauryan emperor,
Ashoka (269-232 B.C.E.), through various Mahayana ("great vehicle") forms
in the first centuries of the Common Era and finally into later highly
ritualistic Tantric or Vajrayana ("thunderbolt vehicle" or "diamond vehicle")
forms from the sixth through the tenth and eleventh centuries.
Not only were Buddhist traditions dominant on the Indian subcontinent;
early along they were exported to South and Southeast Asia (largely in
Theravada forms), and eventually to Tibet, Central Asia, China, Korea and
Japan (largely in Mahayana and Tantric forms), thus becoming a broad, cross-cultural
religious tradition on analogy with the two other broad, cross-cultural
religious traditions, the Christian and the Islamic.
In the land of its birth, however, namely, India, Buddhist traditions
became for the most part extinct after about the fourteenth century of
the Common Era, partly because of the onslaught of the Turko-Afghan Muslim
invaders from the tenth century onwards which caused thousands of Buddhist
monks to be slaughtered or to flee into Tibet and Central Asia, but partly
also because many of its distinctive ideas and practices were simply absorbed
by the larger Hindu culture. In any case, when one hears about Buddhists
in present-day India, it must be kept in mind that there is almost no continuity
between present-day Buddhists in India and the historic traditions of Indian
Buddhism. To be sure, Indian nationalists both before and after independence
were fully aware of the rich contribution that Buddhist institutions and
ideas have made to the larger cultural identity of India, and since independence
various Buddhist show-place monasteries (supported by Buddhist followers
from Thailand, Japan, and so forth) have been maintained in and around
Sarnath, the suburb of the famous city of Banaras, where Gautama the Buddha
purportedly first taught his four noble truths and his eightfold path.
Buddhists in present-day India, however, represent two quite different
orientations, both highly political and both largely re-introductions of
Buddhist traditions into India. Moreover, both re-introductions occurred
in the decade of the l950s. The first has to do with modern India's
great untouchable leader, B. R. Ambedkar (l89l-l956). Born to the
untouchable Mahar caste in the State of Maharashtra in western India, Ambedkar
received a solid education and legal training in Bombay (University of
Bombay), New York City (Columbia University) and London (University of
London), became a spokesman for India's untouchables and was a major critic
of Gandhi and the Congress-led nationalist movement because of its over-reliance
on Hindu ideas and institutions.
Ambedkar detested everything Hindu but agreed to serve in Nehru's first
cabinet as Minister of Law. He also agreed to chair the Drafting
Committee for India's new Constitution and was instrumental in helping
to fashion the final constitutional document. Through the years he
became more and more attracted to Buddhist ideas, since the Buddhist tradition
was an indigenous and authentic tradition of Indian religion that repudiated
the authority of the Brahmins as well as the trappings of the caste system.
In l95l he resigned his cabinet post, travelled to Buddhist countries,
lectured and wrote about Buddhism and then on October l4, l956 led a mass
conversion to Buddhism by thousands of untouchables in the city of Nagpur
in Maharashtra.
Although Ambedkar himself died soon thereafter, the conversion movement
he started spread rapidly among untouchable communities, and within a few
years some 4 million people, largely Scheduled Castes or untouchables in
Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh, had converted to
Buddhism. Ambedkar was also instrumental in laying the groundwork
for a new political party, the Republican Party, specifically designed
to serve the needs of Scheduled Castes and other low-status persons.
Because of Ambedkar's premature death, the political party has not had
any long-term or lasting significance, although it did generate an untouchable
political awareness in independent India that has taken a variety of forms
in more recent years. At any rate, among the 6 million Buddhists
in present-day India, the overwhelming majority are these Neo-Buddhists
from the Scheduled Castes in Maharashtra and elsewhere.
The other dimension of the re-introduction of Buddhist tradition into
present-day India, of course, is the presence of His Holiness, the fourteenth
Dalai Lama, together with the remnant of the Tibetan Buddhist community.
The People's Republic of China "liberated" Tibet in l950, and in l959 when
the Tibetan rebellion in Lhasa against the Chinese was viciously repressed,
the Dalai Lama together with many other monks fled to India. The Tibetans
were given asylum by Prime Minister Nehru in Dharmasala in the northern
State of Himachal Pradesh, and since that time the Tibetans have been working
diligently to preserve Tibetan Buddhist culture in India and to prepare
a Tibetan political movement looking towards a return to Tibet and some
sort of political settlement with the People's Republic of China.
Jains BACK
TO TOP
Unlike the Buddhist tradition which largely became extinct in India
and had to be re-introduced, the Jains have been a small but influential
presence in India since their founding in the sixth century B.C.E. by Vardhamana
("he who is bringing prosperity"), also called Mahavira (the "great hero").
There is some evidence that Jain traditions may be even older than Buddhist
traditions, possibly going back to the time of the Indus Valley Civilization,
and that Vardhamana rather than being a "founder" per se was, rather, simply
a primary spokesman for a much older tradition. Like the Buddhist traditions,
the Jains represent a dissident tradition in Hindu or brahmanical India.
That is to say, like the Buddhists, they too reject the Vedic sacrificial
system and the authority of the Brahmin priests, and encourage or teach,
instead, a mendicant life of disciplined meditation. Also like the
Buddhist traditions, the origins of the Jain traditions are in the
North Central region of the Gangetic Plain in what is now Bihar and the
southern part of Nepal. There were a number of other mendicant groups
in the same region in the sixth and fifth centuries B.C.E., and these various
dissident non-brahmanical traditions are referred to as shramana-groups
or "wandering ascetic"-groups. Jain traditions differ from Buddhist
traditions and some of the other shramana-groups by being much more extreme
in the pursuit of ascetic practices. Jains are usually credited with
introducing the notion of "non-violence" (ahimsa) towards all living things
and the tradition of vegetarianism in India.
As early as the fourth century B.C.E., a great schism occurred among
the Jain ascetics which continues to divide the community down to the present
day. A section known as Digambaras ("sky-clad") which requires
a strict, ascetic life including even the giving up of all clothes or garments
by its mendicant members, hence the name "sky-clad" or naked, broke away
from a more moderate section known as Shvetambaras ("white or cotton-clad")
which is willing to make compromises with ordinary conventional society
and is also willing to allow women into the mendicant life. Eventually
the Digambaras migrated to south India, to southern Maharashtra and Karnataka,
whereas the Shvetambaras migrated to the western region of India, the areas
of Gujarat, Rajasthan, western Madhya Pradesh and northern Maharashtra.
This distribution of the two main sections of Jain traditions continues
to a large extent down to the present, and the 4 million Jains in present-day
India tend to be settled for the most part in the western (Gujarat, Rajasthan
and northern Maharashtra) and southern (Karnataka, and so forth) regions
of the subcontinent, although smaller groups may also be found in almost
every region of India, especially in major urban centers like Delhi and
Bombay. They have traditionally been involved in trade and commerce
(both before modernization and after), especially in Gujarat and Rajasthan.
They tend also to be highly educated and urban-based, although in south
India there is a sizable rural population of Jain farmers.
One interesting historical question is why the Jains were able to survive
in India for so many centuries down to the present day, whereas the Buddhists
became for the most part extinct after the fourteenth century. Part
of the answer relates to royal patronage at certain crucial times in the
regional histories of western India and southern India. Another part
of the answer relates to the extreme puritanical attitude of Jains that
has always given them a definite sense of being separate from the larger
Hindu environment. A third part of the answer, possibly a major
part, relates to certain strategic compromises that Jains were able to
make in the areas of ritual behavior, adherence to local customs and a
willingness under certain circumstances to engage in intermarriage with
certain Hindu groups. Moreover, the Jain monastic traditions have
always maintained close ties with their larger lay communities, and Jain
writers, monks and intellectuals have addressed themselves in detail to
problems of maintaining the Jain identity within the larger sea of Hindu
India.
Parsis and Jews BACK
TO TOP
At least some mention should be made of two additional religious communities
in present-day India that are rapidly becoming extinct but have been in
former years identifiable and influential. As mentioned above, in
the Census of India for l98l, these groups were listed under the category
of "Other Persuasions," the number of Parsis being put at 7l,630, largely
in the city of Bombay and its environs, and the number of Jews being put
at 5,6l8, including the so-called Malayalam-speaking "Cochin Jews" of Kerala,
the so-called "Baghdadi" Jews of the northern cities, and the so-called
Marathi-speaking "Bene Israel" ("Children of Israel") in Maharashtra (mainly
Bombay). In earlier years there were well over l00,000 Parsis in Bombay,
and at the time of independence in l947 there were well over 25,000 Jews.
Since the founding of the State of Israel, however, most Jews have left
India for Israel. There remain only a few small communities of Jewish families
in Bombay, Calcutta and Pune.
Evidence indicates that Jews first came to India around the thirteenth
century along the Malabar coast (the region of Kerala) and were involved
largely in trade and commerce. Others settled further to the north in the
region of Maharashtra. Some have suggested that the Jewish presence
in India is as old as the presence of Christianity, but such a claim is
difficult to document. In addition to trade and commerce in modern
India, Jews have also been involved in manufacturing, civil administration
and the military. They have been largely urban-based.
Parsis are also rapidly disappearing, since one can only be a Parsi
if descended from a Parsi male; in other words, there is no possibility
of conversion to the Parsi faith by a non-Parsi. The name "Parsi"
is a Gujarati form of "Persian" and refers to a small refugee band of Zoroastrians
who came to the northwestern coast of India (Maharashtra, in and around
the Bombay area) some time in the tenth century C.E. after prolonged persecution
following the Arab Islamic conquest of Iran. Over the centuries the Parsis
have built and maintained their sacred "fire temples (some of which are
said to have maintained continuous fire for over a thousand years) and
the well-known "towers of silence" in which the dead are placed to be devoured
by vultures so that the earth is not polluted by the flesh of the dead.
The Parsi community became highly westernized during the nineteenth century
and has played a major role, especially in western India but elsewhere
as well, in the development of India as a modern, industrialized state.
Being itself a separate caste or ethnic group, it has been free from many
of the restrictions that hindered the modernization of many traditional
Hindu castes.