MK

often see this handle posting grandiose takes. but all the supposedly "shakta" regions even mithila are just 10-15 years from islamic takeover. the people from these places are also quite over complicated and inwardly driven. wonder if there is some sort of conditioning that

The Śrīśivarājyābhiṣekakalpataru and Śivājī's Tāntrika Coronation Śākta orientation made more manifest

After the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, Queen Victoria decreed a pact of 'non-interference' where the British would desist from interfering in Indian religious & social affairs. However this has an unintended side effect - a massive one in fact: British authorities now needed to classify what exactly was Indian religion, custom, & tradition. This was a process of calcification & (mis)categorization. Many of those who assisted them were urbane or Anglophilic Brahmins who declared practices as non-Hindu/non-orthodox even though more observant or rural Brahmins would engage in them all the same. That is not to mention the hamfisted lines drawn in front of other Hindu communities whose customs fell beyond the pale of what the interlocutors deemed as 'Hindu.' For the British, this was a boon. This complemented their burgeoning ethno-caste anthropological project that served as the foundation of a legal code which treated castes & communities differently in manners frequently based off their fealty to the Empire. So it is here where we see a simultaneous botched deconstruction of Hinduism and Frankenstein-esque rearrangement of a new body of Indian religion for the purposes of the Raj.

The dividing of Hinduism is most clearly shown in the 'Hookswinging Controversies.' In Tamil Nadu, there was a festival where Hindus used to pierce hooks through their backs & swing with them to appease their local goddess, Mariyammal. Missionaries were horrified by this practice, in particular being disturbed by the parallels to Jesus's crucifixion in the notion of inducing pain for sacrifice. It was also done on Sundays, which they saw was a profound profaning of 'the Lord's Day.' They thereupon conjured a set of contradictory claims to stop the practice: 1. This was a local Dravidian practice so it was non-Hindu and non-religious 2. Brahmins tricked lower castes to conduct this cruel practice to dominate and control them This was despite the fact that people of various castes participated willingly (they saw it as a method of devotion to Mariyammal), that the priests officiating it were non-Brahmin, and that local Brahmins themselves would join in on the celebrations nonetheless. To stop this practice yet stay within the ambit of 'non-religious interference' urged by the Raj, missionaries labeled it as non-Hindu and instead a socio-cultural exercise of cruelty by Brahmins on lower castes. When the festival was stopped by the British, local areas reported cattle dying & crops failing resulting in economic calamity.

Casteism: no one can beat Malayali Savarna Hindu on Casteism! Christians don't stop you from entering church. Muslims don't stop you from entering mosque. Hindus STOP you from entering temples. Yes, that's the Savarna Hindu of Progressive Kerala.

In which case the census needs to make space for us. This tamasha needs to stop. Hamare kandho pe chad ke majority claim ki jati hai. I want to see how many states retain hindu majority once beef (and associated) purity laws are explitised. TN/Assam/WB/Jhk are sure shot.

Sanskritisation preserves local culture. That's why heavily Sanskritised regional cultures like Tulu Nadu, or even Kerala to an extent, are preserved to a large extent. Sanskritisation might appropriate but never destroys. That's why cultures are safe inside it. On the other hand, Abrahamic religions will destroy local culture. Islam has already replaced the traditional costumes of a lot of countries with Burqa.