Page 12 - DSOC201_SOCIAL_STRUCTURE_AND_SOCIAL_CHANGE_ENGLISH

Unit 1: Indian Society

1.2 Cultural and Regional Diversities of Indian Society Notes

The most important aspect of culture in India has been religious diversity. For long India has been
the home of followers of all major religions of the world - Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism,
Buddhism, Jainism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism and Bahaism. Hinduism and all the religions faiths
mentioned above have coexisted together for more than two thousand years within a shared
cultural space. These religious systems may be classed as:
1. Indic or Indigenous
2. Extra-Indic
The Indic religions have originated and evolved in India. The Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and
Sikhism may be described as Indie religions - Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism have evolved from
early Hinduism which has been undergoing changes in content and ritual practices in response to
the prevailing cultural, ethno-lingual and ecological diversities in different regions of the country.
These religions may also be described as protest movements within Hinduism which has also led
to reform within Hinduism. Religions and faiths which originated outside India such as Christianity,
Judaism, Islam, Zoroastrianism and Bahaism may be put in the second category. While Judaism,
Christianity and Islam originated in West Asia, Zoroastrianism and Bahaism originated in Iran.
Although religion is largely a matter of personal faith, religious identity of an individual in India
is often expressed at the social plane. On a number of occasions such as mass festivals or rituals
one finds manifestation of religious identities. Faith of different religions also exhibit a ‘community
feeling’ leaving to conscious or unconscious expression of solidarity. Moreover, common code of
social conduct based on a religious faith also leads to a public expression of a particular religious
identity, that is, a dress pattern, avoidance of certain items of food and several others with some
regional variations.
Hinduism and the Hindus
The plurality of religions in India is often obscured by the fact that Hinduism is generally regarded
as both the demographically dominant and culturally characteristic - even hegemonic - religion of
the country not only in popular imagination but also factually. Four out of every five Indians are
Hindus. “From the cultural perspective, anthropologists and sociologists have provided details of
the many components of culture and aspects of social structure of the so called non-Hindu
communities that have either been borrowed from the Hindus, or are survivals from their pre-
conversion Hindu past, with or without significant alterations” (T.N. Madan, 2003). Unlike the
other religions of India, Hinduism is a federation of faiths, rather than a single homogenous
religion. In fact, Hinduism has been evolving through the ages. It also contains several sects such
as Saivite and Vaishnavite.
Hindus are numerically predominant everywhere; they constitute about 82 per cent of the total
population of the country. However, in the peripheral areas Hindus are outnumbered by the
Muslims (e.g. Jammu and Kashmir and Lakshadweep), by the Sikhs (i.e. Punjab), by Christians
(e.g. Mizoram, Nagaland) and Buddhists (e.g. Arunachal Pradesh). In some regions of the country,
such as parts of Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh, Hindus account for more than 97
per cent of the total population. The proportion of Hindu population is equally high - above 95 per
cent - in the sub-Himalayan districts of Uttar Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh.
The proportion of Hindus in the remaining population remains well above 90 per cent in eastern
Madhya Pradesh, eastern Gujarat, southern Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and coastal Andhra Pradesh.
On the other hand, in some districts along the west coast Hindu percentages are significantly low-
below 70 per cent. Similarly, in the tribal areas of the northeast, such as Meghalaya, Nagaland and
Mizoram, their population is less than 20 per cent and in some cases even less than 5 per cent.
The Hindu proportion is higher in the rural segment of the population - the national average
being 84 per cent - thus revealing the predominantly rural character of Hindu population. As
against this, the proportion of Hindus in the urban population is around 76 per cent. Two-fifths of
the Hindu population lives in the Hindi speaking northern states (viz., Haryana, Delhi, Uttar

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