Country

India

Also Known As Indian

Asia

India is the birthplace of Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism, and it holds pilgrimage sites, monastic lineages and philosophical schools for all four alongside a large, long established Muslim population and smaller Christian, Parsi and Jewish communities. The Vedas, Upanishads, Puranas and the great epics were composed and transmitted here, mostly in Sanskrit, and temple architecture, yoga and tantric traditions, and astrological systems remain living practice rather than historical artifact. Religious identity is also a source of active political tension, including recurring communal violence and disputes over holy sites, which the atlas notes as contested rather than settled. Regional diversity is extreme: Kashmir's Sufi and Hindu heritage, Kerala's ancient Christian and Jewish communities, and Punjab's Sikh homeland each give India internal religious variety that a single national description cannot flatten.

Facts

Law and State

Establishment Status

Secular State Declared 3

The constitution declares India a secular state under the 42nd Amendment of 1976, guaranteeing freedom of religion under Articles 25 to 28; marriage, divorce and inheritance are still governed by separate religious personal laws rather than a uniform civil code.

State Funding Mechanism

India ran a direct Hajj subsidy from 1954, paid as concessionary airline fares and worth about 100 million dollars in 2013 and 75 million dollars by 2016, until Minister for Minority Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi ended it on 16 January 2018, four years ahead of a 2012 Supreme Court order that had directed its gradual phase out by 2022, redirecting the freed funds toward education for minority girls and women. State religious funding continues today through a different channel: statutory endowment boards such as Tamil Nadu's Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Department, overseeing more than 36,000 temples, and the state Wakf Boards administer religious trust income under government supervision rather than through direct budget subsidy. 4

Apostasy or Blasphemy Law

India criminalized religious-feelings insult, not named blasphemy, under Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code, added in 1927 after a prosecution over an anti-Muhammad tract failed to fit the narrower Section 295: it punished deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage the religious feelings of any class of citizens, by words spoken or written, signs, visible representations or otherwise, with imprisonment up to three years, a fine, or both, rising to five years if committed in a place of worship. Effective 1 July 2024 the provision was replaced by Section 299 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which carries forward the same conduct and the same maximum penalty under India's recodified criminal law. India has no apostasy statute; conversion between religions is lawful, though several states restrict conversion procedurally under anti-conversion laws aimed at alleged inducement rather than apostasy itself. Section 295A is cognizable and non-bailable and has been invoked across the political and religious spectrum, against critics of Hinduism, Islam and Christianity alike, and courts have repeatedly narrowed its use to acts carrying genuine malicious intent rather than mere offense. 5

Registration or Recognition Regime

No national law requires a religious group to register, but a group that receives funding from outside the country must register under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act, whose licenses the central government has suspended from numerous religious and charitable organizations, Christian and Muslim among them, citing violations of the act's terms. Separately, twelve of India's states have enacted their own anti-conversion laws as of 2023, generally requiring a district official's prior approval of a conversion and providing fines or imprisonment for anyone found to have induced one by force, fraud or inducement; the laws apply chiefly to conversion out of Hinduism and are administered state by state rather than nationally. 6

Ban or Official Watchlist

The US Commission on International Religious Freedom has repeatedly recommended in its annual reports that the State Department designate India a Country of Particular Concern. On 4 January 2024 the Secretary of State announced the department's Countries of Particular Concern list, renewing twelve other designations, and India was not among them; the commission called the omission unjustified and asked Congress to hold a hearing on the decision. India carries no Countries of Particular Concern or Special Watch List designation from the State Department itself. 7

Concordat Basisthe subject's own account

India holds no concordat with the Holy See. An Apostolic Delegation to the East Indies existed from 1881, and Pope Pius XII raised it to a full internunciature covering all of India on 12 June 1948, shortly after independence. That upgrade formalized diplomatic representation but did not take the form of a bilateral treaty, consistent with India's own constitutional secularism, which recognizes no established religion. 8

Classification

State Funding of Religion

State Neutrality Among Religions 9

Disputed

Legal Status

The constitution declares India a secular state (the word "secular" added by the 42nd Amendment in 1976), guaranteeing freedom of religion under Articles 25-28; marriage, divorce and inheritance are still governed by separate religious personal laws rather than a Uniform Civil Code. 3

India's constitution declares the country a secular state, the word secular itself only added to the preamble by the 42nd constitutional amendment in 1976 rather than present in the original 1950 text, and guarantees freedom of religion to all citizens under Articles 25 to 28. Separately, marriage, divorce, inheritance and related family matters continue to be governed by distinct personal laws specific to each major religious community rather than by one uniform civil code applying equally to all citizens. Whether India should adopt a single Uniform Civil Code replacing these separate religious personal laws, a possibility named in the constitution's non-binding Directive Principles since 1950 but never legislated nationally, is a long-running political and legal debate: proponents argue it would deliver legal equality regardless of religion, while opponents, concentrated among religious minority communities, argue it would override minority religious practice. The debate remains unresolved because no national government has to date enacted the uniform code the constitution's own directive principles contemplate.

Demographics

Religious Composition

About 79-80% Hindu, 14-15% Muslim (one of the largest Muslim populations in the world by absolute number), with Christian, Sikh, Buddhist and Jain minorities (India Census 2011; Pew Research Center, Religious Composition of the World, 2010-2020). 1

Government

Capital

New Delhi 2

Government Type

federal parliamentary republic 2

Sovereignty Status

Sovereign UN member state 2

Established Year

1947 2

15 August 1947 (from the UK)

Geography

Latitude

20.6 degrees north 2

Approximate reference point, rounded to one decimal place; a country's extent has no single center, so this coordinate is conventional, not a survey measurement.

Longitude

79 degrees east 2

Approximate reference point, rounded to one decimal place; a country's extent has no single center, so this coordinate is conventional, not a survey measurement.

Government type (class)

Parliamentary republic 2

Government type (class)

Federal republic 2

Location

Learn More

The Textual Corpus of Classical India

India's classical religious literature spans an unusually long and layered textual tradition, beginning with the Rigveda and the other three Vedas, composed in Vedic Sanskrit and transmitted for centuries through exact oral memorization before being fixed in writing, a preservation method so rigorous that reciters could reconstruct a text precisely even where transmission drifted elsewhere in a lineage.

The Upanishads, composed later and appended to the Vedic corpus, shifted the tradition's center of gravity toward philosophical inquiry into the nature of self and reality, supplying much of the vocabulary later Hindu philosophical schools would debate for two thousand years. The two great epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, developed over centuries through oral and later written transmission and carry embedded religious teaching within their narrative frame, most famously the Bhagavad Gita, a philosophical dialogue set within the Mahabharata that has become one of Hinduism's most widely read texts in its own right.

The Puranas, composed later still, organized much Hindu mythology, cosmology, and sectarian devotional material, including the narratives feeding Vaishnava and Shaiva traditions, into the forms in which they are known today. Buddhism and Jainism, both native to India, produced parallel textual traditions of comparable depth, the former largely in Pali and Sanskrit and the latter chiefly in Ardhamagadhi Prakrit, meaning India's classical output spans several distinct religious systems rather than one continuous line. Sikhism's Guru Granth Sahib, compiled far later in Punjabi and other regional languages, extended this textual tradition into the early modern period.

Contested Sacred Sites in Modern India

Several sites central to Indian religious life sit at the center of ongoing legal and political dispute rather than settled devotional consensus, and this record treats these disputes as attributed and contested rather than resolved. The most prominent is the site at Ayodhya, where a mosque, the Babri Masjid, stood until its demolition by a Hindu nationalist crowd in 1992, an event following decades of dispute over whether the site marked the birthplace of the deity Rama and had previously held a Hindu temple; India's Supreme Court ruled in 2019 to award the site for construction of a Hindu temple while directing that alternate land be provided for a new mosque, a decision that resolved the legal question without resolving the underlying historical and communal disagreement, which independent observers describe as still unsettled.

Kashmir carries a related but distinct layer of contested religious and political history, holding significant Sufi shrines, Hindu temple sites, and a Buddhist heritage in Ladakh, all set within a decades long territorial dispute between India and Pakistan that has shaped religious demography and access to sites on both sides of the line of control. Communal violence linked to religious identity recurs periodically in various Indian states, documented by domestic and international human rights reporting, and the country's constitutional commitment to secularism sits in active tension with religious nationalist movements that some observers describe as reshaping that commitment in practice, a characterization noted here as contested rather than adopted as settled fact. These disputes are a documented feature of religious life in contemporary India rather than a marginal footnote to it.

India

3 entries

Giving Obligation Enforceability

Practice Status

Founded Era

Kind of organization

Activity

Connections

Ancient and Historical Regions

Assam

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Assam

Bihar

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Bihar

Deccan

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search results for Deccan

Gujarat

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Gujarat

Himalayas

Source WorldAtlas: Where Are the Himalayas

India

Source India (Wikipedia)

Karnataka

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Karnataka

Kerala

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Kerala

Maharashtra

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Maharashtra

Manipur

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Manipur

Meghalaya

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Meghalaya

Punjab

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search results for Punjab

Rajasthan

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Rajasthan

Tamil Nadu

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Tamil Nadu

Uttar Pradesh

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Uttar Pradesh

Uttarakhand

Source GeoNames: GeoNames search for Uttarakhand

Associated With

The Jain Network

This source names India directly: "public, especially Jain communities in India and the UK, through education and training and through the relief of poverty, sickness and distress."

Source The Jain Network: Charity Commission Filed Accounts, Year Ended 31 March 2025The Jain Network (trustees' annual report and accounts, filed with the Charity Commission)

The Komagata Maru Incident Blocks Sikh Immigration

This source names India directly: "and continuous passage directly from India, a route that did not exist and made the requirement effectively unmeetable."

Source Sikhs In Canada (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

The Many Lives of a Rajput Queen: Heroic Pasts in India, c. 1500 to 1900

This source names India directly: "groups and monastic communities in India between roughly 1500 and 1900."

Source The Many Lives of a Rajput Queen: Heroic Pasts in India, c. 1500 to 1900Ramya Sreenivasan

The Origins of Om Manipadme Hum: A Study of the Karandavyuha Sutra

This source names India directly: "syllable mantra Om Mani Padme Hum in India around the middle of the first millennium CE, built around a detailed annotated precis of the Karandavyuha Sutra, the text in which the mantra first..."

Source The Origins of Om Manipadme Hum: A Study of the Karandavyuha SutraAlexander Studholme

The Pilgrimage to Nankana Sahib

This source names India directly: "draws thousands of Sikh pilgrims from India and around the world each year, most heavily around Gurpurb, the anniversary of Guru Nanak's birth."

Source J.S. Grewal, The Sikhs of the Punjab (New Cambridge History of India II.3)J. S. Grewal

The Piprahwa Project (Peppe family research site)

This source names India directly: "of the Piprahwa stupa in northern India, the stone reliquary coffer, five inner reliquaries, charred bone fragments, roughly 1,800 accompanying gems, and the inscribed vase naming the Sakya clan."

Source The Piprahwa Project (Peppe family research site)Chris Peppe and others

The Religious and Medicinal Uses of Cannabis in China, India and Tibet

This source names India directly: "Medicinal Uses of Cannabis in China, India and Tibet, published in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs in 1981, is a peer reviewed survey of the textual evidence for ritual and medical cannabis use..."

Source The Religious and Medicinal Uses of Cannabis in China, India and TibetMia Touw

The Sants: Studies in a Devotional Tradition of India

This source names India directly: "the Sant devotional tradition of North India, the loosely connected poet-saints, including figures such as Kabir, whose teaching emphasized a formless divine beyond caste and sectarian boundary."

Source The Sants: Studies in a Devotional Tradition of IndiaKarine Schomer and W. H. McLeod (eds.)

The Sikh Empire Rises And Falls In Punjab

This source names India directly: "and two wars with the British East India Company, the empire was formally dissolved by proclamation on 30 March 1849 and annexation completed 2 April 1849, ending Sikh political sovereignty in the..."

Source Sikh Empire (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

The Silk Road Journey with Xuanzang

This source names India directly: "monk Xuanzang from Chang'an to India and back, tracing the historical route stage by stage."

Source The Silk Road Journey with XuanzangSally Hovey Wriggins

The Temple of the Emerald Buddha (World History Encyclopedia)

This source names India directly: "the image's legendary journey through India, Sri Lanka, Cambodia and the northern Thai kingdoms, its 1434 discovery at Chiang Rai and its installation in its purpose built Bangkok temple in 1784..."

Source The Temple of the Emerald Buddha (World History Encyclopedia)Kim Martins

The Yavanajataka of Sphujidhvaja

This source names India directly: "of Hellenistic Greek astrology into Indian form, with Pingree's extensive commentary tracing exactly how the transmission happened."

Source The Yavanajataka of SphujidhvajaDavid Pingree

The Zoroastrian Trust Funds of Europe

This source names India directly: "in Mumbai, Udvada and Navsari, India; the Trust has also periodically issued emergency medical relief appeals for members of the Zoroastrian community."

Source The Zoroastrian Trust Funds of Europe: Trustees' Annual Report and Financial Statements, Year Ended 31 March 2025The Zoroastrian Trust Funds of Europe (Incorporated), Trustees, with an independent auditor's report by Brian Paul Limited

Theosophical Society Adyar (Wikipedia)

This source names India directly: "Society headquartered near Chennai, India, tracing its history from the society's 1875 founding in New York through Henry Steel Olcott and Helena Blavatsky's move of its headquarters to Adyar in 1882."

Source Theosophical Society Adyar (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Tibetans

India hosts the Dalai Lama, the exile administration at Dharamsala and the refounded monasteries.

Source Tibet: A HistorySam van Schaik

Timur's Campaigns Nearly Extinguish the Church of the East

This source names India directly: "stretching from the Mediterranean to India and China."

Source The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian ChristianityChristoph Baumer

Twitter's Sewa International Donation: Image Rehabilitation for RSS-Linked Charity? (TwoCircles.net)

This source names India directly: "An independent Indian news feature, published 24 May 2021, used only for its plainly documented structural claims: that Sewa Bharati is the RSS's service wing and Sewa International's parent..."

Source Twitter's Sewa International Donation: Image Rehabilitation for RSS-Linked Charity? (TwoCircles.net)Pieter Friedrich, TwoCircles.net

Unfinished Gestures: Devadasis, Memory, and Modernity in South India

This source names India directly: "of devadasis, temple dancers of South India, and how their history is remembered and contested in modern India."

Source Unfinished Gestures: Devadasis, Memory, and Modernity in South IndiaDavesh Soneji

Uprising of the Fools: Pilgrimage as Moral Protest in Contemporary India

This source names India directly: "as Moral Protest in Contemporary India, published by Stanford University Press in 2017, is a scholarly study examining Hindu pilgrimage, particularly to Amarnath and other sites, as a form of moral..."

Source Uprising of the Fools: Pilgrimage as Moral Protest in Contemporary IndiaVikash Singh

Vasubandhu

This source names India directly: "was a fourth to fifth century CE Indian Buddhist scholar-monk from Purushapura (modern Peshawar) in Gandhara, the younger half-brother of Asanga and, with him, one of the two principal architects of..."

Source Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyEdward N. Zalta and Uri Nodelman (eds.)

Vision and Mission (Sewa International Official Page)

This source names India directly: "1989 founded Sewa Bharati network in India and to disaster response work following the 1993 Latur earthquake, headquartered in Sugar Land, Texas with chapters across the United States."

Source Vision and Mission (Sewa International Official Page)Sewa International Inc.

White Paper on the Punjab Agitation

This source names India directly: "Agitation, issued by the Government of India in 1984, is the government's own official account of the events surrounding Operation Blue Star and the wider Punjab crisis of that year."

Source White Paper on the Punjab AgitationGovernment of India

With Respect to Sex: Negotiating Hijra Identity in South India

This source names India directly: "and community in Hyderabad, South India, based on extended fieldwork and published by the University of Chicago Press."

Source With Respect to Sex: Negotiating Hijra Identity in South IndiaGayatri Reddy

Wives of the God-King: The Rituals of the Devadasis of Puri

This source names India directly: "different regions and temples of India, and the institution as a whole became the subject of considerable colonial-era moralizing and later reform legislation, so a claim generalizing from the Puri..."

Source Wives of the God-King: The Rituals of the Devadasis of PuriFrederique Apffel-Marglin

Words of Destiny: Practicing Astrology in North India

This source names India directly: "Destiny: Practicing Astrology in North India, published by the State University of New York Press in 2021 in its Hindu Studies series, is an ethnography of astrological practice in Banaras built on..."

Source Words of Destiny: Practicing Astrology in North IndiaCaterina Guenzi

World Zoroastrian Organisation

This source names India directly: "across the UK, Canada, Georgia, India, the Netherlands, Pakistan and the United States, with objectives spanning poverty relief, education, sickness relief and the provision of burial grounds for..."

Source The World Zoroastrian Organisation Ltd: Charity Commission Filed Accounts, Year Ended 31 December 2024The World Zoroastrian Organisation Ltd (trustees' annual report and accounts, filed with the Charity Commission)

Xuanzang Temple, Nanjing (Wikipedia)

This source names India directly: "temples in China, Japan, Taiwan and India."

Source Xuanzang Temple, Nanjing (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Zakir Naik

This source names India directly: "October 18, 1965 in Bombay (Mumbai), India, and trained originally in medicine before turning to public speaking on comparative religion."

Source Zakir Naik (Wikipedia)

Zanzibar Derasar (Jain Treasures)

This source names India directly: "have" the first Jain derasar outside India, with the first murtis ever consecrated outside India, Parsvanath, Shantinath and Mahaveerswami; and that those murtis were relocated to Nairobi in 1964..."

Source Zanzibar Derasar (Jain Treasures)Jain Treasures

Zanzibar's Revolution Displaces Its Jain Temple

This source names India directly: "a first foothold for Jainism outside India, moved on to Kenya."

Source Zanzibar Derasar (Jain Treasures)Jain Treasures

Zorba the Buddha: Sex, Spirituality, and Capitalism in the Global Osho Movement

This source names India directly: "around him, tracing its history in India, at Rajneeshpuram in Oregon, and after Rajneesh's death."

Source Zorba the Buddha: Sex, Spirituality, and Capitalism in the Global Osho MovementHugh B. Urban

Zoroastrianism in India (Wikipedia)

This source names India directly: "Wikipedia's "Zoroastrianism in India" article, carrying a Census of India population table for the Parsi community: 114,890 in 1941, 91,266 in 1971, 69,601 in 2001, 57,264 in 2011, each figure..."

Source Zoroastrianism in India (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Zoroastrians Convene the 12th World Zoroastrian Congress in New York City

This source names India directly: "Zarathushti Existence, with retired Indian Supreme Court Justice Rohinton F."

Source 12th World Zoroastrian Congress 2022 NYC (FEZANA)

Zoroastrians Migrate To Gujarat

This source names India directly: "sailed for the west coast of India and, according to the community's own account, the Qissa-i Sanjan, landed at Sanjan on the coast of Gujarat, where a local ruler granted them refuge on condition..."

Source Parsis (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices

This source names India directly: "Zoroastrian communities in Iran and India alongside the historical and textual record, following the tradition from ancient Persia through to the living Parsi and Iranian Zoroastrian communities she..."

Source Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and PracticesMary Boyce

Showing 151 to 185 of 185 in Associated With, page 4 of 4.

Contains

Ajanta Caves

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Ajmer

Ajmer Sharif

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Amarnath Cave

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Amritsar

Amritsar is in the state of Punjab in north west India.

Source J.S. Grewal, The Sikhs of the Punjab (New Cambridge History of India II.3)J. S. Grewal

Anandpur Sahib

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Archaeological Survey of India

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Ayodhya

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Badrinath

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Bodh Gaya

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Brihadishvara Temple

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Delhi

Dilwara Temples

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Dwarka

Dwarkadhish Temple, Dwarka

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Ellora Caves

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Fatehpur Sikri

Fatehpur Sikri is in Agra district in Uttar Pradesh.

Source Religious and Intellectual History of the Muslims in Akbar's Reign, with Special Reference to Abu'l Fazl (1556-1605)S. A. A. Rizvi

Gangotri

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

Girnar

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Govardhan Hill

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Great Stupa of Sanchi

Its own text: "in Madhya Pradesh, India."

Source The Symbolism of the StupaAdrian Snodgrass

Gurdwara Tuti Gandi Sahib, Muktsar

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Guruvayur

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Gyanvapi Mosque

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

Harmandir Sahib (The Golden Temple)

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Hemkund Sahib

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Indian Museum, Kolkata

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Jagannath Temple, Puri

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Kalighat Kali Temple

Source The Sakta PithasD. C. Sircar

Kamakhya

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Kashi Vishwanath Temple

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Kedarnath

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Kolkata

Konark Sun Temple

Stands on the Bay of Bengal coast in the state of Odisha, India.

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

Kurukshetra

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Kushinagar

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Lotus Temple

Its own text: "standing in New Delhi as one of the continental Mother Temples," serving the Indian subcontinent.

Source A Concise Encyclopedia of the Baha'i FaithPeter Smith

Mahakaleshwar Jyotirlinga Temple

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

Mathura

Mathura is on the Yamuna in the state of Uttar Pradesh.

Source India: A Sacred GeographyDiana L. Eck

Mathura

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Meenakshi Amman Temple

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Menri Monastery

Source The Bon Religion of Tibet: The Iconography of a Living TraditionPer Kvaerne

National Museum, New Delhi

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Nizamuddin Dargah

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

Palitana and Shatrunjaya

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Patna

Patna stands on the site of ancient Pataliputra.

Piprahwa Stupa

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Rajgir

Rajgir is a town in Nalanda district in Bihar.

Source India: A Sacred GeographyDiana L. Eck

Ramanathaswamy Temple, Rameswaram

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Ranakpur

Source Divinity Atlas Entity Records, First Edition

Showing 1 to 50 of 78 in Contains, page 1 of 2.

Originated Here

Ahimsa Hand

Source The JainsPaul Dundas

Akshaya Tritiya

Source Akshaya Tritiya (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Ambubachi Mela

Source Ambubachi Mela (Wikipedia)

Bada Udasin Akhara

Source Uttar Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation: Akharas of the Kumbh (Uttar Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation)

Bhai Dooj

Source Bhai Dooj (Wikipedia)

Bharat Sevashram Sangha

Source Bharat Sevashram Sangha (Wikipedia)

Brahmo Samaj

Source Brahmo Samaj (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Buddhism

Source New World Encyclopedia: Buddhism

Chaturmasya

Source Chaturmasya (Wikipedia)

Chhath Puja

Source Chhath Puja (Wikipedia)

Chishti Order

Source Sufi Martyrs of Love: The Chishti Order in South Asia and BeyondCarl W. Ernst and Bruce B. Lawrence

Chishtiyya (Chishti Order)

Source Sufism: A Global HistoryNile Green

Das Lakshana Parva

The Digambara Jain observance of the ten virtues.

Source The Oxford Dictionary of World ReligionsJohn Bowker (ed.)

Dhanteras

Source Dhanteras (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Diwali

Source Diwali (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Durga Puja

Source Durga Puja (Wikipedia)

Dussehra

Source Vijayadashami (Wikipedia)

Ganesh Chaturthi

Source Ganesh Chaturthi (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Govardhan Puja

Source Govardhan Puja (Wikipedia)

Gudi Padwa

Source Gudi Padwa (Wikipedia)

Gurdwara Reform Movement

Source Gurdwara Reform Movement (Wikipedia)

Guru Purnima

Source Guru Purnima (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Hanuman Jayanti

Source Hanuman Jayanti (Wikipedia)

Holi

Source Holi (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Jainism

Source New Advent, Catholic Encyclopedia: Jainism

Karva Chauth

Source Karva Chauth (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Kathina

The robe-offering month, prescribed in the Indian monastic code.

Source The Princeton Dictionary of BuddhismRobert E. Buswell Jr. and Donald S. Lopez Jr.

Krishna Janmashtami

Source Krishna Janmashtami (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Kumbh Mela

Source Kumbh Mela (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Madariyya

Source Madariyya (Wikipedia)

Maha Shivaratri

Source Maha Shivaratri (Wikipedia)

Makar Sankranti

Source Makar Sankranti (Wikipedia)

Naga Panchami

Source Naga Panchami (Wikipedia)

Nanakshahi Calendar

Source The Oxford Handbook of Sikh StudiesPashaura Singh and Louis E. Fenech (eds.)

Navaratri

Source Navaratri (Wikipedia)

Nirmal Akhara

Source Uttar Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation: Akharas of the Kumbh (Uttar Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation)

Onam

Source Onam (Wikipedia)

Paryushana

Source Paryushana (Wikipedia)

Pitru Paksha

Source Pitru Paksha (Wikipedia)

Pongal

The Tamil harvest festival of the first days of Thai.

Source The Hindu Religious YearMuriel Marion Underhill

Punjabis

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)Encyclopaedia Britannica editors

Radha Soami

Source Wikipedia: Radha Soami

Radha Soami Satsang Beas

Source Radha Soami Satsang Beas (Wikipedia)

Rajneesh Movement

Source Zorba the Buddha: Sex, Spirituality, and Capitalism in the Global Osho MovementHugh B. Urban

Raksha Bandhan

Source Raksha Bandhan (Wikipedia)

Ramakrishna Order (Ramakrishna Math and Mission)

Source Encyclopedia of HinduismDenise Cush, Catherine Robinson and Michael York (eds.)

Ramayana

Source The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (Encyclopedia.com): Ramayana

Ratha Yatra

Source Ratha Yatra (Wikipedia)

Sant Shri Asaramji Bapu Ashram Trust

Source Al Jazeera: High-Profile Guru Asaram Bapu Sentenced to Life for Rape

Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee

Source Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (Wikipedia)

Showing 1 to 50 of 63 in Originated Here, page 1 of 2.

Sky Figures Read Here

Bengali

West Bengal is a state of modern India.

Spread Events Here

Akbar Confers the Title Jagadguru on Hiravijaya Suri

Source The JainsPaul Dundas

Akbar Invites Dastur Meherji Rana to the Ibadat Khana

Source The Ibadat Khana (World History Encyclopedia)

Aurangzeb Executes Guru Tegh Bahadur in Delhi

Source Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji (DSGMC)

Buddhism Arises in the Ganges Plain

The Ganges plain, in the modern Indian states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.

Source History of Indian Buddhism: From the Origins to the Saka EraEtienne Lamotte, translated by Sara Webb-Boin

Buddhism Is Revived Among Dalits in India

Deekshabhoomi, Nagpur, Maharashtra, India.

Source Dhammachakra Pravartan Din (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Buddhism Nearly Disappears From India

Nalanda, Vikramashila and Odantapuri, in what is now Bihar, India.

Source Nalanda Mahavihara (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Devarddhi-gani Redacts the Svetambara Canon at Valabhi

Source Devarddhi-gani: Canon Redaction at Valabhi (Jainpedia)

India Grants Jains National Minority Status

Source Jains in India Get Minority Status (Al Jazeera)

India Launches The Jiyo Parsi Scheme

Source Jiyo Parsi Scheme (Drishti IAS)

India's Government Halts Tourism at the Jain Site of Sammed Shikharji

Source Sammed Shikharji Eco Sensitive Zone Tourism Stay (Press Information Bureau, Government of India)

Islam Spreads in South Asia Through the Chishti Order

Ajmer and Delhi, in India.

Source Sufi Martyrs of Love: The Chishti Order in South Asia and BeyondCarl W. Ernst and Bruce B. Lawrence

Kandhamal (Odisha) Anti-Christian Violence (2007 to 2008)

Kushan-Era Inscriptions at Mathura Date Jainism's Earliest Named Community

Source Vincent A. Smith, The Jain Stupa and Other Antiquities of Mathura (Archaeological Survey of India, 1901)Vincent A. Smith

Narendra Modi Consecrates the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya

Source Modi Inaugurates the Ram Mandir at Ayodhya (CBS News)Arshad R. Zargar

Parsis Establish Bombay As Their Community's Centre

Bombay (now Mumbai); no separate city entity exists in the graph, so this anchors to India.

Source Parsis (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Partition of India

Queen Lokamahadevi Builds the Virupaksha Temple at Pattadakal

Source Group of Monuments at Pattadakal (UNESCO World Heritage Centre)

Rajaraja I Dedicates the Brihadeeswarar Temple at Thanjavur

Source Great Living Chola Temples (Archaeological Survey of India)

Shivaji's Coronation at Raigad Establishes Hindavi Swarajya

Source Stewart Gordon, The Marathas 1600-1818 (Cambridge University Press)Stewart Gordon

Sivaskandavarman Performs the Ashvamedha and Grants Land to Brahmins at Kanchipuram

Source K.A. Nilakanta Sastri, A History of South India: From Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar (Oxford University Press)K.A. Nilakanta Sastri

The 1992-93 Bombay Riots

The Babri Masjid Demolition and 1992 Nationwide Riots

The Digambara-Svetambara Split Is Completed

Across the Indian subcontinent; the Vallabhi council itself sat in Gujarat.

Source Digambara (Encyclopaedia Britannica)The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

The Goa Inquisition Suppresses Hindu Worship in Goa

Source Goa Inquisition (Wikipedia)

The Maha Kumbh Mela Draws Hundreds of Millions to Prayagraj

Source Maha Kumbh Mela 2025 (Prayagraj District Government)

The Mughal Empire Establishes Islam as Dominant in North India

Source Islam in India (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

UNESCO Inscribes the Moravian Church Settlements on the World Heritage List