What is the issue?
Due to growing vertical religious diversity, few ‘gurus’ are involved in horrific exploitation of their own followers.
What are the forms of religious diversity in India?
- Diversity of religion - The existence in society of a populace professing faith in distinct, well-demarcated Hindu, Christian, Jewish or Islamic ideals.
- Diversity within religion - It is horizontal diversity a religion is internally differentiated because its core beliefs and practices are differently interpreted, especially by competing elites.
- Vertical diversity -This occurs when people of the same religion engage in diverse but hierarchically arranged practices.
What are the characteristics of vertical diversity?
- They are a bulwark against the homogenising practices of large, powerful, totalising religions.
- It inherent in religiously diverse societies,possibility of both inter-religious and intra-religious domination.
- They invent gods, identify gurus, and develop forms of worship of their own, often away from the eye of, and sometimes in tension with caste-laden Hinduism.
- Song-based devotionalism among women of virtually all castes.
- Meditation-based practices of individual salvation among all.
What are the impacts of vertical diversity?
- Every form of diversity, including religious diversity, is entangled in power relations.
- The basic interests of one group are threatened by the actions of another.
- It involves discrimination, marginalisation, humiliation, exclusion, reproduction of hierarchy.
- Domination can develop between religions, within religions, and even within faith practices of the marginalised.
- It affects individuality and personal freedom, at times these are egalitarian, and focus on mental and physical health.
How this diversity issues can be addressed?
- It would be wise overlook the aspects of these organisations.
- Resistance of intra- and inter-religious domination must be developed.
- A straightforward, unbiased examination will eliminate institutionalised religious domination.
Source: The Hindu
