[360-11]. Singh, Rana P.B. 2011. Holy Places and Pilgrimages in India: Emerging Trends & Bibliography; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India.

[360-11]. Singh, Rana P.B. 2011. Holy Places and Pilgrimages in India: Emerging Trends & Bibliography; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India. Planet Earth & Cultural Understanding Series, Pub. 8. Shubhi Publications, New Delhi: pp 07-56. ISBN: 81-8290-228-2. Price Rs 1495.oo/ US $ 55. © Rana P.B. Singh.

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Holy Places and Pilgrimages in India: Emerging Trends & Bibliography

Rana P.B. Singh Banaras Hindu University, India

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Abstract. Among the ancient epics, the Mahabharata, dated ca 5th century BCE, is the first source of Hindu pilgrimages (tirtha-yatra). The mythologies of medieval period eulogised the sacred places and their sacred spots. These works describe how the pilgrimage symbolises spiritual progress and how it would be beneficial in getting relief from sins and worldly affairs. Pilgrimage is prescribed as a duty for spiritual merit. The notion of Hindu pilgrimage symbolised different contexts like route, place, riverbank, and also sites associated to sages. The typology of sacred places is described in ancient texts on the scale of location, merit, associational context, and intensity of power. In general, a four-tier hierarchy of pilgrimage places is accepted. According to ancient mythology and the Hindu mind-set still the most popular sacred place is Kashi (Banaras), eulogised as one of the three ladders to the heaven; the others are Allahabad and Gaya. These three together form ‘bridge to the heaven’. Keywords: cosmic circuit, faithscape, ghostscape, Hindu belief system, Kumbha Mela, mandala, sacredscape, typology. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Flower-like the heels of the wanderer, His body growth and is fruitful; All his sins disappear, Slain by the toil of sacred journey.

— Aitareya Brahmana (Rig Veda), 7.15.

The Hindu places of pilgrimage are the symbols of the religious beliefs of Hinduism; they reflect its vitality, resilience, and syncretism. They broadly define and continually reemphasize the Hindu sacred space. They have knitted the linguistically diverse Hindu population socially, culturally, and spatially at different integrative levels. — Surinder Bhardwaj (1973: 228).

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1. Pilgrimage Studies: Trend and Perspective

Pilgrimage has been major motive of movement and migration of people since ancient past, however pilgrimage is mostly associated with travel to sacred sites, whether these sites are of nature’s or of human making (cf. Scott 2009). The early narratives of Chinese travellers Fa-hsien (early CE 5th century) and Hsuan-tsang (early CE 7th century) to India remind the tradition of sacred journeys in quest of experiencing awe, wonder, mysticism and special places of power. Obviously there is difference between pilgrimage and tourism; nevertheless the structural similarities between them are also acceptable. Pilgrimages are primarily religious journeys in nature. It is a universal phenomenon and belongs to human experience of sanctity of place, generating a particular pilgrim- behaviour in journey and rituals performed as expressed in the ties between the religious attitude and lived space, and also the symbolic expression involved therein referring to the cosmic understanding of human being (cf. Osterrieth 1997). Pilgrims, pilgrimage centres, pilgrim circulation, associated sacred ecology and psychosomatic views of pilgrims are the main concern in pilgrimage studies (cf. Sopher 1967: 53-54, also 1968), where space, place and movement form the spatial queues. Journey, circulation, and sacred experiences are the three basic phenomena of Hindu pilgrimage. The popularity of religious travel can be seen not only in the increase of religiously motivated travel to sacred sites but also in the combining of New Age spirituality with pilgrimage travel (cf. Timothy and Olsen 2006: 4). Increasing impact of diasporas has also encouraged pilgrimages to Hindu sites, however such pilgrimages are often closely entangled with religious tourism. Similarly the increasing pace of heritage tourism is also promoting pilgrimages to sacred places having heritage sites. In spite of so many potential and varied phenomena, and the pervasiveness of religious tourism and spiritual connections to place, relatively few scholars have explored the multitudinous and multifarious relationships between religion, culture, spirituality, tourism, especially heritage and religious tourism. It is strongly expected that pilgrimages would go under significant changes as the world becomes more mechanised, modernised, and liberalised, but it will assuredly continue to expand (cf. Timothy and Olsen 2006: 276).

Pilgrimage in Hindu tradition is always seen as a form of penance and indeed even today imposed as punishment or relief for secular offences as comparable to the Catholic tradition in the Middle Ages. In the process of assimilation pilgrims also learn to perform ancillary devotional exercises ― sometimes even to worship false shrines or situational shrines.

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According to Hindu tradition, a pilgrimage journey is a sacramental process which has two aspects. It is a spatial symbol of the progressive participation of a person in the realm of spiritual sphere (say faithscape); and also it theoretically establishes, actually and psychically, a two-way relationship between a pilgrim and divine being (God) ― thus forming a spiritual concern. This tradition is similar to the Catholic tradition (see Rudhyar 1983: 238).

According to the ancient narration of the Rig Veda, dated ca 13th century BCE, the notion of tirtha (sacredscape) symbolises at least four connotations in ancient Hindu literature: (i) a route going to a place where one can receive manifestive power; (ii) the bank of a river where one can take holy dip as rite of purification; (iii) a sacred site where lies the power of manifestation; and (iv) the religious territory which became sacred due to divine activities and work of the god/s. In all these connotations spatio-cultural dimension lies in the background.

There are two polarised ways to study pilgrimage. The one is nomothetic, looking for normative laws and generalisations in a particular way; it is close to positivistic approach. The other is ideographic which leaving aside the laws and generalisation, reflects the object’s specific, in-dividual qualities either through text or context, or taking both together. The former was common among geographers during 1960s and 1970s; while the latter still dominates in the Indological studies (e.g. Miyamoto 2003).

In Indological tradition the anthology edited by Gopal and Dubey (1990), and Bakker (1990) are the notable works. Bakker’s volume is based on the panels of the VII World Sanskrit Conference, and the nine essays there deal with the history of sacred places in India as reflected in traditional literature. Taking the first part of Narayana Bhatt’s Tristhalisetu (c. CE 1580) Saloman (1984) has produced a critical edition with detailed notes and comparison with other contemporary texts. Dubey’s works (2000, 2001) on Prayaga/ Allahabad and the pilgrimage festivities held there, are mostly based on puranic mahatmya literature and treatises. The mahatmya literature (the Puranas) provide mythological stories as to how, why, to whom in and in which manner pilgrimage to be performed (cf. Bhardwaj 1973: 58-75). In total they describe how the pilgrimage symbolises spiritual progress and how it would be beneficial in getting relief from sins and worldly affairs. During medieval period many digests and treatises were written ― all describing the glory of various holy places in different ways at different magnitudes. These descriptions, in fact, are the rearrangement and selections from the puranas with commentaries.

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The historical perspective, Indological context and spatial frame have been admirably integrated by Bakker (1986) in his magnum opus, Ayodhya, which covers history, religious activities, puranic description, mahatmya literature and critical appraisal of the source materials available. His colleague, Entwistle (1987) has produced a similar volume on Braj. Both of these works are inspired by their teacher, Jacob Ensink (1974) whose own work has paved the path in this direction.

Malik (1993) considers two broad approaches to the pilgrimage studies: textual traditions of growth mid its historical background, and the study of “ideology” that underlies and generates it the institutions of’ pilgrimage journey (tirthayatra). There has always been “interruptions” leading to dichotomy, dialogue and complementarities, but these “interruptions” serve to create a multilayered, multifaceted culture which is sometimes superficially referred as “tradition against itself.” Malik (1993) challenges Bakker (1986) about his intention to “demytholise” texts on the ground that attempt to historicize the religious while using the term “myth” referring Biblical events has never worked in Hindu traditions; using idea of “myth” in Biblical term in case of Hindu tradition is a false epistemology. He further opines that the real question to analysis is the “rationale” of these texts than to look for an understanding “historical and geographical reality.” He suggests that for studying pilgrimage and sacred places in Hindu tradition one needs an integrated frame which includes several contexts like ideological, literary, institutional, historico-political, sectarian, socio-cultural, and above all the Hindu psyche of faith and belief systems.

In a broad perspective three groups of researches were carried out in pilgrimage studies: (a) the ritual-spatial context of sacred places at various levels of social organisation ― individual, family, society, and cultural group ― and in different contexts and ways; (b) the growth of meanings and feelings attached to sacred places, taking history as a means to elucidate the sequence of their existence, continuity and maintenance; and (c) a typology of sacred places in terms of contrasts, similarities and degrees of manifestive powers (cf. Lawrence 1992 : 228-229).

On the basis of the emerging literature, eleven broad focal themes are categorized that cover the wide spectrum of pilgrimage studies, viz.:

§ Pilgrimage Studies: theories, emerging trends, sources of studies. § Conceptual Frame: Sacrality and spiritual quest, environmental

interaction. § Cosmic Purview and Sacred Ecology: Sacred geometry, cosmic and

pilgrimage mandala, archetypal view.


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§ Historical Outline: Origin and growth of sacredscapes, patronage and process.

§ Travel Genre: Distance, cost, motivation, circulation, seasonality, density, mode.

§ Typology and Hierarchy: Sacredscapes-pilgrimage-pilgrims ― varieties, networks and linkages.

§ Sacred Time: Auspiciousness and astronomy, calendars, time geometry.

§ Sacred Rituals: Ritualisation process ― functions and meanings, festivities, economics, organisations.

§ Sacred Functionaries: Followers, records, relationship, multi-religious performances, role and impacts.

§ Sacred Systems: Organisations-sects, cults, traditions, cross-cultural contexts.

§ Heritage Preservation: Sites and monuments, environmental ethics, ecological order, peace and feelings, awareness, perspectives and plans.

2. Geographical Context: Circulation, typology and

cosmic frame

The first detailed bibliography on pilgrimages with a short introduction was prepared by Singh (1987b: 525-564). The widely cited catalogue-type descriptive works on holy places of India, include Dave’s (1957-61, 4-vols.) work on 120 places, the Gita Press: Kalyana’s Tirthank (1957; covering about thousand places), and Mishra’s edited Sanmarga: Tirtha Visheshank (1987; 64 essays). On global level two books on the geography of pilgrimages published by Antoni Jackowski (1991) in Polish are still known for its comprehensive coverage.

In a recent study (Malse and Ghode 1989), following gazetteer-approach and cartography the place description of Pandharpur has been narrated; this study lacks integration of texts, context and symbology. A leading Indian geographical journal by publishing an anthology on the geography of pilgrimages and has attempted to pave the path of peregrinology (Singh and Singh 1987). Out of nine essays in this volume, four deal with India; and the one notable is on geography of pilgrimages in Poland by Antoni Jackowski.

The phenomenon of circulation with reference to spatial manifestation has been analysed by Sopher (1968) in his pioneering study of “Pilgrim circulation in Gujarat”. Of course, heavily impressed by nomothetic approach, he has also correlated the social characteristics, and finally

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posed several issues for exploring the role of cultural determinants in pilgrimage. Another in-depth study is presented by Bhardwaj (1973), who based on pilgrims’ responses tried to prepare five-level hierarchy of holy places. A detailed investigation of circulation in Hindu pilgrimage is further described by Bhardwaj (1985, also 2009). Analysing the relationship between pilgrim circulation and past politico-cultural influence, Spencer (1969: 52-56) has noted a sort of symbiotic relationship. The anthropological purview of circulation is tested in case of pilgrimage to Amarnath by Aziz (1982).

First explicit geographical classification in terms of geographic scale, frequency and routes was proposed by Stoddard (1966) and finally twenty four categories are marked. This classification is more nomothetic abstract and gives less emphasis on the belief system and phenomenology of religion. Bharati (1963, 1970) was pioneering in presenting the typological frame of pilgrimage centres on the basis of regional frame and their importance (see the debate, Bhardwaj 1997: 8-11).

With respect to belief systems and practices as prescribed in the texts and as experienced by the pilgrims, the holy places may be classified into three groups: (i) Water-site, associated mostly with sacred bath on an auspicious occasion, (ii) Shrine site, related to a particular deity and mostly visited by the pilgrims belong to, or attached to a particular sect or deity, and (iii) circuit area (Kshetra), the journey of which gives a special merit as it has preserved some form/system of cosmic mandala like in case of Varanasi, Mathura, Ayodhya, etc. The best known work on ranking based on Sanskrit texts is presented by Saloman (1979).

The concept of “pilgrimage mandala” is introduced by Singh (1987a) with the study of fifty-six pilgrimage journey routes in Varanasi. The numerical symbolism and its cosmic association are described in terms of varieties of divinities, location and rout-affinity and also compared the festivities ― all with respect to text and context. This study has been further expanded in the light of sacred topography and religious images (Singh 1988a). Ambroise’s (1982) study also throws a fresh fight on this aspect. These studies provide a new way to understand the miraculous intervention, and cultural pattern of miracles, and ultimately to the understanding of cosmic implosion (Preston 1986). The cosmic interpretation of the holy places is also narrated by Morinis (1984: 284-290) in his classical study of pilgrimage tradition in West Bengal. Also, Eck (1986: 41-55) in her study of cosmos and paradise of Varanasi has projected this aspect. Exploring the religious geography by interpreting texts through uncovering a multitude of intersecting, overlapping and disconnected regions that co-exist in the western part of


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India, Feldhaus has explained the intricacy of regional identity and the role of ‘sacradness’ (Feldhaus 2003).

3. Anthropological Dimension

In his pioneering work on sacred complex of Gaya and Kashi, Vidyarthi (1961; also Vidyarthi, et al. 1979) had taken three aspects of the study, i.e. sacred geography, sacred performances, and sacred function-aries. At the grass root level an in-depth anthropological study with deeply integrated insight is produced by Alan Morinis (1984) based on detailed study of the three holy places in West Bengal, viz. Tarakeshvar, Navadvip and Tarapitha. The well-known anthology on geography of pilgrimages (Stoddard and Morinis 1997), deals with six Indian pilgrimages out of eighteen essays.

A work based on detailed field investigation dealing with gender and politics in Himalayan pilgrimage (Nanda Devi) was presented by Sax (1991). Toomey (1989) discussed the importance of food in pilgrimage with the case study of Mount Govardhan. Gold’s (1988) great work of exploration and deep thought on Rajasthani pilgrimage combines intimate sensing, experiential feelings and religious understanding and finally provides a unique account of peregrinology. She says: “Mostly I tell what people did and what they said about what they did, and what they said about what they did, to each other and to me” (ibid.: xiii).

4. International Conferences and Proceedings

With the initiative of Makhan Jha in the 11th International Congress of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences, ICAES, held at Vancouver in 1983 a special session on pilgrimage (mostly based on India) was organised and later on selected papers were published (Jha 1985). Most of these papers deal with sacred places, like Tirupati, Mithila, Ujjain, Puri, etc. In 1988 under 12th ICAES another symposium was held at Zagreb, Yugoslavia, and proceedings was published in which out of twenty, seventeen essays referred to India (Jha 1991). In the history of pilgrimage studies Conference on “Pilgrimage: The Human Quest”, held at University of Pittsburgh in May 1988, has been referred as milestone (Morinis 1992). Its proceedings consists of twelve papers. In Hindu context, two of these essays dealing with spiritual magnetism, and pilgrimage-tourism, by Preston (1992), and Cohen (1992a, b) are the well-known theoretical discussion on this theme. A multidisciplinary International Conference on “Pilgrimage and Complexity” held in January 1999, and its proceedings

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consists of thirteen papers, including the one on Varanasi, and Gaya (Malville and Saraswati 2009). In the three recently held conferences, viz. the 3rd International Convention of Asia Scholars, Singapore: 19-22 August 2003, the 18th European International Conference on Modern South Asian Studies, Lund: 6 - 9 July 2004, and the 19th World Congress of History of Religions, Tokyo: 24-30 March 2005, a panel on ‘pilgrimage and sacred places’ with emphasis on spirit of place, heritage preservation, and ecological harmony, respectively, had been organised by Rana Singh, but the proceedings are not yet published. In 2009 under the ages of the 16th ICAES a panel on ‘Heritagescapes and Sacredscapes’ was organised at Kunming, China: 27-31 July 2009, and three volumes, including this one, are published in 2010.

The Society of Pilgrimage Studies (Allahabad) has also sponsored a few of the seminars on pilgrimage on the occasion of Ardha/ Kumbha Mela and published the proceedings (cf. Gopal and Dubey 1990; Dubey 2000, 2001); most of the papers deal with historical, Indological and statistical contexts of pilgrimages. Essays included in the Proceedings of a Conference on ‘Sacred Space and Sacred Biography in Asian Religious Traditions’ explore the role of sacred place in creating a specific local religious identity explained by tests, mythologies and experiential stories, of course in a complex and ambiguous way that can easily be explained with reference to ‘contextuality’ and the ‘cultural conditions’ (Granoff and Shinohara 2004a).

5. Pilgrimages: Indian Context

Touring is an outer journey in geographical space primarily for the purpose of pleasure seeking or curiosity. Pilgrimage in the traditional sense is an inner journey manifest in exterior space in which the immanent and the transcendent together form a complex phenomenon. Generally speaking, human beings need both — outward and inward journeys. Hindu tradition, or more appropriately Sanatana Dharma (‘the eternal religion’), has a strong and ancient tradition of pilgrimage, known as Tirtha-yatra (‘tour of the sacred fords’), which formerly connoted pilgrimage involving holy baths in water bodies as a symbolic purification ritual. Faith is central to the desires, vows and acts associated with pilgrimage, and pilgrimage is a process whereby people attempt to understand the cosmos around them. The number of Hindu sanctuaries in India is so large and the practice of pilgrimage so ubiquitous that the whole of India can be regarded as a vast sacred space organised into a system of pilgrimage centres and their hinterlands (Bhardwaj 1973: 7).


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In pilgrimage studies using ‘text’ as a way to see the past and understanding ‘context’ is to see the contemporary situation receiving strong attention with reference to image worship that looks simple but it possesses the complex, fluid, and contested nature of religiosity and cultural underpinnings. The five essays in a recent anthology deal with these themes. The studies establish the notion of ‘crossing the religious boundaries’ from locality to universality, disorder converging into order, complexity changes into simplicity, starting from profane but reach at the sacrality, moving on the route and reaching to the cosmic territory (i.e. from circumference to centre), wonder to legitimate, and so on … (Granoff and Shinohara 2004b).

Hindu belief systems, considered by many to be the world’s oldest surviving religion, dates back to approximately 3000 BCE. It is the third largest religion in the world after Christianity and Islam, consisting of approximately 13 per cent of the world’s population. Hinduism is the majority religion in India, Nepal, Mauritius, and on the island of Bali in Indonesia, as well as a secondary or otherwise major religion in Guyana, Fiji, Surname, Bhutan, Trinidad and Tobago, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Singapore. Many other countries also have large South Asian-based Hindu populations, including Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and South Africa.

Hindu belief system is a polytheistic faith that reveres several gods and goddesses who have control over various elements of creation, life conditions, and nature. Hindu belief system is an inclusive religion in that its adherents accept that all religions are paths to the same goal and are therefore highly tolerant of people of other faiths. Hindu belief system is unique from other world religions in that there is no messiah, guru, or founding prophet. Instead, according to Hindu tradition, the Creator simultaneously formed both the universe and all knowledge about it. Seers, or Rishis, obtained this knowledge directly from the Creator and recorded it in sacred writ known as the Vedas, which are comprised of a complex (to the non-Hindu) system of sub-levels of holy writings and epic tales that provide guidelines for achieving harmony in life. Similarly, there is no central religious headquarters or individual authority to interpret religious canons. Instead, each individual learns what he or she must do to seek his or her own piety and higher level of being.

Travel for pilgrimage purposes is an important part of Hindu doctrine and millions of adherents travel throughout India and from abroad each year to participate in enormous festivals, pilgrimage circuits, and ritual cleansings. Likewise, thousands of people of other religions visit India each year to admire its ancient and beautiful Hindu architecture and

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important historical sites that are associated with the religion. This chapter focuses specifically on Hindu religious tourism in India, with primary stress being placed on forms and functions of sacred sites, pilgrimage events and routes, and places of sacred value.

6. Hindu Pilgrimage: History & Mythology

According to the Mahabharata (13.111.18), a fifth century BCE. epic containing the holy scripture Bhagavad Gita, pilgrimage places are auspicious for Hindus because of the extraordinary power of their soil, the efficacy of their water, and because they were made holy by visits by the sages (holy wise men) (Bhardwaj 1973; Sharpley and Sundaram 2005). By journeying to these powerful places and performing sacred rites, pilgrims obtain what are called ‘fruits’, or a transformation of themselves or their life situations (Sax 1991:13). Through the combined processes of sacralisation, ritualisation and deeper interconnectedness, places become distinct ‘scared places’ or sacredscapes, possessing the characteristic of an eternal bond between the human psyche and the spirit of nature (Singh 1995: 97). For Hindus, pilgrimage (Tirtha-yatra) is an act and process of spiritual crossing; to cross the sacredscape is to be transformed.

Pilgrimage is a spiritual quest — a guiding force unifying divinity and humanity; it is a search for wholeness. Ultimately the wholeness of landscape and its sacred and symbolic geography creates a ‘faithscape’ that encompasses sacred place, sacred time, sacred meanings, and sacred rituals and embodies both symbolic and tangible psyche elements in an attempt to realise humankind’s identity in the cosmos. The act of pilgrimage, including the journey, activities, and experiences of compa-nionship, is itself a ritual with has transformative value, a reinterpretation of the idea of “experience”. This is where one begins. The Hindu term Tirtha-yatra itself denotes this quality. According to Hindu beliefs, by undertaking a pilgrimage, an individual is transformed and begins life anew.

Of all the religious practices associated with Hindu tradition, pilgrimage is believed to be the most important and meritorious rite of passage. Hindu pilgrimage involves three stages: initiation (from the time one decides to take the journey to the beginning of the journey), liminality (the voyage itself and experiences involved), and re-aggregation (the homecoming). The human quest to find peace and experience sacred space drives faith-building and the desire to travel (Singh 2006). Feelings associated with positive pilgrimage experiences and faith-building pilgrims return to their normal life and share experiences with other


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members of society. This forms a cyclic frame of travel known as ‘pilgrimage mandala’ (Fig. 1.1).

Fig. 1.1. Pilgrimage as Religious Duty.

In Hindu tradition, pilgrimage is believed to be the most important and

merit-giving act. Pilgrimage as a rite of passage involves three stages of function: initiation (from awareness to start), liminality (the journey itself and experiences), and reaggregation (the homecoming). A model of Hindu perspectives on pilgrimage (Fig. 1.2) would explain this issue. Starting from a believer (person) to the Ultimate, at least four layers exist but they are interconnected through sacred space and sacred time. In theological context this is the eternal will to interconnect a person to the Ultimate while in social context it refers to a march from individual to universal humanity. The act of pilgrimage starts from inner space (home) to outer territory, and later in the reverse manner returning to the home. Pilgrimage is a way to heal the body and the soul by walking and opening the soul to the spirit inherent in Mother Earth. Sacrality binds space, time,

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territory and the functionaries ― altogether converge into a sacrosanct spatial organisation, as illustrated in case of the Kumbha Mela (Caplan 1980, 1997).

Fig. 1.2. Hindu Outlook of Pilgrimage.

The notion of tirtha symbolises at least four connotations in ancient Hindu literature: (1) a route to a place where one can receive power (Rig Veda, RgV: 1.169.6; 1.173.11); (2) the bank of a river where people can dip in the water as a rite of purification (RgV 8.47.11; 1.46.8); (3) the sacred site itself which possesses the power of manifestation (RgV: 10.31.3); and (4) places that sacralised based upon divine happenings and work of the god(s) that took place there (Shatapatha Brahmana 18.9). As in many other religions, place and space are an integral part of Hindu pilgrimage.

With the revival of traditional Hindu belief systems during 1950s pilgrimages became more popular. Of all domestic travel in India, over one-third is for the purpose of performing pilgrimage (Rana 2003: 171). The growth and importance of pilgrimage tourism may be related to an


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increased desire among Hindus to assert their identity against an ever more visible Muslim population. Such competition emerged more actively after the destruction of Babri Mosque at Ayodhya on December 6, 1992, by conservative nationalist Hindu groups who wished to build a temple on this sacred site, which is assumed to be the birth place of Lord Rama. This act of aggression resulted in civil disturbances throughout the country. Since then large numbers of Hindus have become more conscious of their Hindu heritage, resulting in increased participation in traditional rituals, celebrations, the construction of temples, and of course pilgrimages.

The great epic of the past, the Ramayana (dated ca. 1000 BCE) does not directly describe pilgrimages, but it does narrate the routes traversed and the places visited by Lord Rama during his exile. It also draws attention to the natural beauty and inherent powers of important sacred places. These places (e.g. Ayodhya, Prayag, Chitrakut, Panchavati, Nasik, Kishkindha, and Rameshvaram) through the course of time developed as important sites of pilgrimage, and many of them are still known throughout all of India as significant places to visit. The Mahabharata epic (ca. 5th century BCE), contains several detailed sections about the ‘grand pilgrimages’. The ‘Book of the Forest’ (3.82) and the ‘Book of the Administration’ (13. 108) are especially important as they provide descriptions of some 330 places and 12 grand pilgrimage routes covering all corners of India, from Kashmir (north), to Kamarupa (east), Kanyakumari (south), and Saurashtra (west) (Bhardwaj 1973).

The mahatmya literature (the Puranas) of the medieval period, dated the 8th to 16th centuries, provides mythological stories as to how, why, to venerate whom, and in what manner pilgrimages should be performed. In total they describe how pilgrim travels symbolize spiritual progress and how pilgrimage is beneficial in being delivered from sins and worldly affairs. These descriptions refer to several aspects of spiritual transfor-mation:

• Part of religious duty implies being free from other worldly duties.

• One should seek the support of deity to fulfil the journey. By so doing, pilgrims associate more closely with divinities.

• One should seek religious companionship and try to meet other groups of pilgrims while travelling.

• There should be a desire to enhance fellowship in the sect they are associated with.

• Pilgrims should seek to understand the sacred symbols and knowledge of auxiliary shrines and divinities.

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• Travellers should try to encounter areas they have not previously visited or known much about.

• Difficult and arduous journeys are a form of penance. • Pilgrimage is an opportunity to experience earth powers to

improve overall well-being, harmony, and happiness.

According to the regional tradition (e.g. Marathi) the notion of tirtha-yatra (‘pilgrimage’) in Hindu tradition has at least seven common aspects that make this unique and comprehensive (Glushkova 2002-03, 2003, 2006), viz.

• not bound to specific or definite goal, • start and end both meet at the one point/site, • crosses the regional boundary, • intentionally not creating any austerities as pre-requite or process, • promotes the complexity towards ‘wholescale’ resulting to link several

places together, • carrying and generating its own associated rituals, promotes donation and

feeding Brahmins, and • paving the path of spiritual passage for future life and liberation

These notions have their own local variations distinctly illustrated with

the ritualscape that developed in the past and continued even today (Glushkova 2007). During the medieval period many digests and treatises were written, all describing the glory of various holy places in different ways at different magnitudes. These descriptions, in fact, are re-arrangements and selections from the purānas with commentaries, although in many cases some original sources are missing. The earliest among them is Laksmidhara’s Krityakalpataru (ca. 1110 CE) where a full canto is devoted to pilgrimages. One example is Tirthavivechana Kanda. Other important sources are Vachaspati Mishra’s Tirthachintāmani (ca. 1460 CE), Narayan Bhatta’s Tristhalisetu (ca. 1580 CE), and Mitra Mishra’s Tirthaprakāsha (ca. 1620 CE). These literatures have yet to be fully interpreted and compared to the field of pilgrimage studies. To this author’s great surprise, while performing pilgrimage journeys himself he personally found a very close correspondence between the spatial narra-tion given in the purānic sources and the present situation in Allahabad, Varanasi, Gaya, and Chitrakut. A thorough literary description of mythologies and literature on Hindu pilgrimage can be found in Kane (1974: 11-16).

The perception of and awareness to pilgrimage in Hindu tradition may be generalized under the four broad perspectives:


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§ Pilgrimage as a ceremony is an interlinking web of sacred space, sacred time and sacred nature where interrelatedness among the five gross elements of life organism (panchamahābhutas), i.e., earth (land), water, air, fire and sky (ether), is remembered, celebrated and experienced. As community of action, pilgrimage is lived in and experienced as a whole system of interrelated types and varieties of divine energies.

§ Pilgrimage is an open system in a sense that it takes and gives the divine energy and matter. It is open as far as the bonds of the cosmos; but it is also enclosed within a hierarchy of internal boundaries – space within space, time within time, system within system. The pilgrimage as system has the capacity to regulate the harmonic relationship between man and divine nature, and to make visible their manifestation on the earth.

§ Pilgrimage is an understanding of meaning as occurring within the sacredscape through its imageabilty and expressive qualities. This, together with concomitant gain of a “moral sense of nature” has been the ‘major discovery of the great seers and sages of the past. The system of pilgrimage is a ‘whole of reality’ where holiness gets resort in a field that is latently alive, filled with expression and meaning and certainly deserves human’s reverence.

In the life context, pilgrimage involves all the matter, substance and consciousness of human being in its drama of eternal journey. It embodies the domain of divine life-only those having potentials can experience and understand the meaning: meaning is a form of being, and for this we need an eye of the clairvoyance ― “Clear Seeing.” However, “lest they be trivialized by a secular society that destroys the inner meaning of everything it touches. But the reality is there” (Berry 1992: 131). The most common ritual act in any form of Hindu pilgrimages is darshan (“auspicious glimpse”) taken by pilgrims. The darshan has at least three categories, viz. samparka (direct contact, touch), dristigat (visual, without touch), and durasta (seeing from distance). For samparka darshan, very long queues of people waiting are common among the important temples/shrines (cf. Stanley 1992: 85).

7. A Taxonomical Assessment of Hindu Pilgrimage Places

Classifying holy places has been an important theme of geographic concern in terms of origin and location, motive, association, and manifestation of power. According to the Brahma Purāna (70.16-19) pilgrimage sites may be classified into four categories: divine sites related

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to the specific deities; demonic sites associated with the mythological demons who performed malevolent works and sacrifices there; sage-related sites associated with the lives of important spiritual leaders; and man-perceived sites, which are not believed to be “chosen” but merely discovered and revered by humans. This taxonomy is not watertight, as some places may overlap categorical lines, being important divine and sage-related sites, for example.

The first exhaustive and annotated list of about 2000 Hindu sacred sites, shrines and places was presented by Kane (1974). The other catalogue-type descriptive works on Hindu holy places include Dave’s (1957-61) 4-volume work (in English) and the Gita Press’s (1957) Kalyāna Tirthānk that consists of short and popular essays on 1820 holy places of India (in Hindi). According to the Kalyāna Tirthānk list, 35 per cent of all sacred places are associated to the god Shiva, followed by Vishnu (16 per cent), and the goddess (12 per cent).

The feminine spirit of nature has received special attention in the books of mythology. There are 51 special sites on the earth, which symbolize the dismembered parts of the goddess’s body. Every region has its own tradition of varying forms of goddess (e.g. the state of Maharashtra’s) (Feldhaus 2003). The Tantric tradition symbolised these sites as resting sites of pilgrimage by the goddess, resulting in a transformation of energy (Dyczkowski 2004). These 51 goddess-associated sites later increased to 108 (Singh 1997a, 2010). During the medieval period, all these sites were replicated in Varanasi and are still active sites of pilgrimage and other rituals (Singh and Singh 2006).

With respect to belief systems and practices as prescribed in the Sanskrit texts and as experienced by pilgrims, holy places may be classified into three groups: water-sites, associated primarily with sacred baths on auspicious occasions; shrine sites related to a particular deity and mostly visited by pilgrims who belong to, or are attached to a particular sect or deity; and circuit areas (Kshetra), the navigation of which gives special merit based on some form or system of cosmic mandala as in case of Varanasi, Mathura, and Ayodhya (Salomon 1979).

Cohn and Marriott (1958) utilized micro to macro level acceptance and attractive fields as scale of classification of the Hindu sacred places. Bharati (1963, 1970) also applied a similar approach. In terms of geographic scale, frequency and routing, Stoddard (1966, 1968) proposed a typology of twenty four categories. He concluded that factors such as minimal aggregate travel distance, closer to larger urban centres, and social characteristic, like dominance of a particular cohort of the Hindu population, are not influential upon the distribution of holy places in India.


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This classification gives less emphasis on the belief systems and phenomenology of religion. In his pioneering study Sopher (1968) used simple statistical indices to measure pilgrim regions in Gujarat and to classify them. A more detailed and integrated frame of six hierarchical classes of holy places was presented by Preston (1980), a notion that needs more serious attention by geographers in explaining the intricacies of location, institutional base, specific characters and sacred geography of holy places in India.

Fig. 1.3. Important Hindu Places of Pilgrimages (after Singh 1997: 194)

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Bhardwaj (1973) described and classified Hindu holy places in historical context, albeit without evolution and distribution not properly emphasised together. Since there are several religious traditions and sects within Hindu tradition, it would be more satisfactory to account for the distribution of their sacred places in reference to their development and regional representation, their sacred topography, and perceived and imposed meanings.

In general from the perspective of geographical scale and coverage, Hindu pilgrimage places may be seen as pan-Indian, those attracting people from all parts of India and glorified in the classical Hindu scriptures; supra-regional, referring to the chief places of the main sects and mostly linked to founders of various shrines (e.g. Pandharpur) (Mokashi 1987); regional, connoting the site’s dominance in a particular culture or language group and perhaps narrated as representative of pan-Indian places; and local spots associated with ordinary sacred geography, attracting people from nearby villages or towns. Of course there does exist superimposition and transition among these groups, and over time the status of these places may changes as well. Moreover, there also exist multilevel places whose identity changes according to sacrality of time and specificity of celebration nevertheless these sites maintain, of course loose, hierarchy and traditionally generated appropriate relationship among them (Preston 1980, also cf. Preston 1992). The seven sacred cities (Sapta-puris) include Mathura, Dvarka, Ayodhya, Haridvar, Varanasi, Ujjain and Kanchipuram. Similarly, the twelve most important Shiva abodes are scattered all over India and are known as Jyotir lingas tirthas. The four abodes of Vishnu in the four corners of India are another group of popular pilgrimages (Fig. 1.3). These are the examples of pan-Indian pilgrimage places.

8. Hindu Pilgrimage: Victor Turner’s Theoretic Construct

Victor Turner had been the pioneer that created a model for studying pilgrimage within a social context. The main focuses of Turner’s research in Rhodesia were the so-called rites of passage. During the ritual, the person is status-less. Turner called this particular part of the ritual the ‘liminal phase’ (limen (Lat.), threshold). Rites of passage often take place outside of the community in which the initiation to a new stage of life takes place. Turner saw a strong sense of unity among the novices during this liminal phase, which contrasted the structure of the society they normally live in. Difference in status among them did not seem to matter anymore since people from all classes and families appeared to form a


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homogenous group. Turner called this sense of unity ‘communitas’. After returning to the original community, everyone however takes on again its old position and status.

For Turner, communitas develops in the interstices of social structure: among the poor, outcasts, and those like artists and religious virtuosos who consciously remove themselves from some of the constraints of society (Badone and Roseman 2004: 3). In case of India, there appear varieties of conditions and resultant diversification that is mostly due to her size and mosaicness of culture where still the religious traditions and belief systems are the makers of mindset. Their suggestion that pilgrimage replaces the rite of passage as the primary locus of liminality and communitas, also needs critical evaluation in Indian situation, where with the growing consciousness of maintaining identity and making social image high, the pilgrimage traditions are accepted as process and a way for upward mobility.

Communitas, because of its contrast to the structure of society, is therefore described by Turner as ‘anti-structure’. By doing so he replaces, at least for the field of pilgrimage, the Durkheimian theory that religion has a positive influence on social structure, as explicitly in Hindu tradition. Though both see pilgrimage primarily as a social act, their views on the effect it has on society are opposite. Within the Durkheimian school it is thought of as reaffirming social structure, whereas the Turnerian school sees pilgrimage as a factor of renewal within society.

Turner and Turner (1978: 31) suggestion that ‘the popular, individu-alistic, and charismatic character of pilgrimage renders it problematic from the point of view of orthodox religious authorities in many traditions’; however, in Hindu traditions, which is an amalgam of so many sub-traditions that are open to welcome others’ traditions, orthodoxy, textual, modernity and transformation work together and thus converges the ‘mosaicness’ ― like a sacred wholeness where the ‘commanilities’ (sama-janya) are shared by all, but ‘distinctiveness’ (vishistvya) is maintained by the individuals, but ‘desperateness’ is not encouraged. Of course, it is to be significantly recorded that the “touristic” aspects of pilgrimage journeys are frequently condemn by the sacred authorities, such as sightseeing or participation in fairs or amusement performances. Never-theless, on the profane level this is acceptable by the sacred authorities, because of the fact that such activities support their economy. Turners’ point of view that these activities represent an important aspect of the total pilgrimage process and should not be ignored in anthropological analyses is legitimately accepted in Hindu tradition. Of course they are right to remark that the non-liturgical features of pilgrimage also give rise to

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communitas, even if such activities are not declared legitimately “religious” (ibid.: 37).

One of the case studies of pilgrimage that Turner described in his book ‘Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors (1975) is the pilgrimage to Pandharpur in Maharashtra (India). He uses the work of G.A. Deleury (cf. Turner 1975: 194) and Irawati Karve (1962, cf. Turner 1975: 205) as his sources. Already here we can see the first problems with the idea of communitas, since it only exists within the separate groups that undertake this pilgrimage. The same pilgrimage forms the subject of Stanley’s contribution (1992), who too notices a problem in applying the term communitas to all cases of pilgrimage. While Turner still spoke of ‘existential communitas’ in the Pandharpur case, Stanley brings it down to ‘normative communitas’. He clearly discerns in this group-structured- pilgrimage the boundaries that are brought about by social structure.

Several anthropologists discovered that in many cases of pilgrimage, there was no communitas to be found at all. Rather, social structures were maintained throughout the entire pilgrimage. Unlike Stanley, they do not try to hold on to Turners ideas of communitas as anti-structure. This situation prevails in most of the sacred places in India. Through his pioneering work on pilgrimage in Bengal Morinis has further approved this statement (Morinis 1984: 274). It is also noted that when every aspect of pilgrimage seems to be social, political or economical, it can still be seen as a ‘bounded entity’, a separate analytical category. Most of the anthropologists agreed on the fact that it cannot.

In an attempt to restore pilgrimage as an analytical category, J.E. Llewellyn, in the introduction to his study of the 1998 Kumbha Mela in Hardvar, turns to the notion of the sacred as the factor that distinguishes the goal of the pilgrim from centres of political or economical activity. He acknowledges that this could bring along the danger of discarding all secular aspects of pilgrimages as unimportant compared to the elevated ‘sacredness’. He quotes Eck and Eliade, who both ascribe an ontological status to ‘the sacred’, to illustrate this danger. Without denying or acknowledging the existence of ‘the sacred’, Llewellyn decides only to study the visible, unknowing of ‘what lies behind it’ (Llewellyn 2001: 4-12). This leads to an attitude of methodological agnosticism in which Llewellyn studies pilgrimage to a certain degree from an insider’s perspective. The sacred cannot serve as a means for interpretation since it is not an empirical category. Pilgrimage will therefore be studied from an outsider’s perspective as well, without making any ontological judgements about the sacred. The boundaries of the term ‘pilgrimage’ are set by emic concepts, but it is studied from an etic perspective.


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9. Hindu Pilgrimage: Bhardwaj

The cultural geographer Bhardwaj (1973) classified pilgrimage sites with respect to the size of the area from which pilgrims are drawn (catchment area) serves as the basic criterion for the rank of a sacred place in this classification. At the top stand the so-called ‘pan-Hindu sites’, to which Hindus from all over the world make pilgrimages. Varanasi/ Kashi is an example of this category. At the bottom of the list one finds ‘local shrines’ that are visited only by people from the direct surroundings.

Having made a ranking list of sacred places according to the size of their catchment areas, Bhardwaj finds that there is a correlation between the caste composition of pilgrims at sacred places and the ranking of this place in his hierarchy. People who visit pan-Hindu or supra-regional shrines are generally from higher castes than those who visit regional or local shrines (Bhardwaj 1973: 188-192). In addition, he finds that the motives for pilgrimage vary between places of different rankings as well. Pilgrimages to the highest levels of shrines are made to gain spiritual merit, whereas pilgrimages to lower level shrines have more tangible purposes. Bhardwaj calls the latter ‘specific pattern’ (Bhardwaj 1973: 169-172). His generalisations are supported by recent works (cf. Singh, Rana 2003).

Morinis criticises Bhardwaj in his case study of West Bengal (Morinis 1984: 234-236). His criticism has been taken over and expanded by Llewellyn (2001: 8). To some extent both of them present valid objections to Bhardwaj’s theory. Morinis’ main objection is that Bhardwaj’s findings only fit the situation in Himachal Pradesh, the area where Bhardwaj did his research. Moreover, he argues that Hindu pilgrims have their own rankings of sacred places with much variety from one region to another, and that there is hardly any correspondence of these with Bhardwaj’s system (Morinis 1984: 235). This is something Bhardwaj himself had already acknowledged (Bhardwaj 1973: 226). His system is etic and has no other claims than being an analytical tool in geographical research.

Ann Grodzins Gold (1998), in her Rajasthani fieldwork found a similar distinction between pilgrimage destinations. The pilgrims discern two types of pilgrimage. The pilgrimages to local shrines, referred to by the villagers as jatra (a Rajasthanised form of Sanskrit yatra), were undertaken for clearly defined purposes. The term yatra on the other hand, was used by the Rajasthani villagers to denote pilgrimage to distant shrines without a specific tangible purpose but for ‘merit’ (Gold 1998: 136-146). Gold’s study provides the necessary material to show that Bhardwaj’s findings can be applied outside Himachal Pradesh as well.

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The problem of self-interest, as Llewellyn shows, is a central theme in the study of Hindu pilgrimage. In a review article on three books on Hindu pilgrimage he concludes that ‘there are likely to be ‘political’ motivations at work, even when the pilgrims themselves claim that they are only interested in pilgrimage for its own sake’ (Llewellyn 1998: 263). The distinction between interested and non-interested pilgrimage is taken too far by Llewellyn when he uses the terms selfish and unselfish and then it becomes useless. Rather the distinction should be kept a bit more modest.

10. Morinis’ Semantic Model

Morinis not only questions Bhardwaj’s hierarchy of pilgrimage sites and Turner’s communitas theory, but also finds that no existing theories provide a useful basis for analysis of his material of Bengali pilgrimage (Morinis 1984: 275). He notices that only two characteristic features of pilgrimage occur in all types of pilgrimage. These are ‘sacred places’ and ‘the act of journeying itself’. Though this touches the essence of the institution, Morinis finds it unsatisfactory since it only deals with the surface of the phenomenon: ‘When one begins to ask questions such as why Bengali Hindus undertake pilgrimages, and how such practices gain acceptance within wider patterns of Bengali Hindu culture, the answers must be sought in more abstract levels of culture than the observable’ (ibid.: 276).

Morinis discerns two sets of meanings of pilgrimage. The first is ‘the explicit understanding of the participants themselves’ and the second consists of ‘the literary and theological depictions of the cosmos and man’s journey through it which are an integral (if unconscious to most pilgrims) aspect of the Hindu pilgrimage tradition’ (ibid.: 277). Here he seems to solely search for religious meanings of pilgrimage without an open eye to social, political and economical aspects. He replaces anthropological theories on pilgrimage by a theology of Hindu pilgrimage.

Like many other Indianists, Morinis also studied sacred space and Hindu pilgrimages apart from their social, historical and political context, however he was quite convincing when he described the meaning of pilgrimage as given by the participants, and that opens the comprehensiveness for understanding the pilgrims’ lifeworld and cultural behaviours carried by them. He has mentioned that:

‘At tile explicit level of meaning, the necessity of the journey of pilgrimage derives from beliefs about sacred places. One must go out in search of sacred space since it is distinct from the mundane space in which on lives. Places of pilgrimage are depicted as the most potently infused


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sacred sites; one travels to a sacred place when the instruments of religion closer at hand do not satisfy one’s needs. The journey of pilgrimage take place when some specific feature of the sacred place recommends itself to the pilgrim as especially suited the type of interaction with the divine he seeks’ (Morinis 1984: 105).

In the context of second ‘set of meanings’, Morinis suddenly considers ‘Hindu belief system’ a homogenous religion and provides a highly Eliadean and cosmological explanation of sacred places and pilgrimage (Morinis 1984: 282-299). First for presenting a hierarchy of sacred places that is not held by all Hindus (ibid.: 235), while Bhardwaj doesn’t even claim to do so. Morinis takes the meaning of the architecture of Hindu temple as a basis for interpreting the Hindu concept of sacred space and sacred places, and comes up with an interpretation of sacred space as a model of the cosmos. Morinis’s basic constructs fully fit in case of many pan-India level sacred places in both the ways, viz. the function and use of sacred places, and the psychic world of devout pilgrims.

At the very end of his book, in a footnote, Morinis comes back to Bhardwaj, suggesting that in the end there is no difference between material and spiritual pilgrimage. ‘It may be rather that participants are tapping different levels of meaning according to their familiarity with the explicit and implicit meaning of the institution’ (Morinis 1984: 298). All pilgrimages are a journey of the soul to the One, only the pilgrims themselves do not know it. When geographical, political or economical factors that participants are usually unaware of, are taken into account in an analysis of Hindu pilgrimage, it is done because the researcher has the purpose to learn something about pilgrimage from a geographical, political or economical point of view.

Morinis, who finds the existing models for the analysis of Hindu pilgrimage insufficient, proposed a model that studies pilgrimage from another viewpoint than the existing geographical, political, social and economical models. His semantic model seems to be a theological model. It might represent the emic explanations of pilgrimage as given by Hindu pilgrims, but it remains to be seen whether the view that pilgrimages are ‘journeys of the soul to God’, which the author mainly derives from ancient Sanskrit texts, is to be confirmed by the empirical study of ritual behaviour. By taking on ‘God’ or ‘the One’ as an ontological category, and using it in explaining pilgrimage, he gives a religious explanation of religious behaviour and closes his eyes to ‘secular’ matters at work in pilgrimage. Obviously, this makes Morinis’ model unsatisfactory for anyone who wishes to study Hindu tradition with a methodologically agnostic attitude towards any of the transcendent referent of ‘the sacred’.

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11. Scenarios at ‘Three bridges to Heaven’

According to one of the most authoritative Sanskrit texts on pilgrimage and sacred places, the Tristhalisetu (TS – ‘Holy Bridge of Three Sacred Cities to Heaven’), dating from the late sixteenth century, the three pillars of the ‘bridge to the realm of soul’ are Prayāga (Allahabad), Kashi (Varanasi), and Gaya. The first two are located on the Ganga River, and Gaya lies on a tributary of the Ganga.

(i) Kumbha Mela, Allahabad: the world’s largest pilgrimage

gathering Sacred site festivals in India (melās) are a vital part of Hindu

pilgrimage traditions. Celebrating a mythological event in the life of a deity or an auspicious astrological period, melās attract enormous numbers of pilgrims from all over the country (cf. Lochtefeld 2004). The greatest of these, the Kumbha Melā, is a riverside festival held four times every twelve years, rotating between Allahabad located at the confluence of the rivers Ganga, Yamuna and the mythical Sarasvati, Nasik on the Godavari River, Ujjain on the Shipra River, and Haridvar on the Ganga (Fig. 1.4). Bathing in these rivers during the Kumbha Melā is considered an endeavour of great merit, cleansing both body and spirit. The Allahabad and Haridvar festivals are routinely attended by millions of pilgrims (13 million visited Allahabad in 1977, some 18 million in 1989, and over 28 million in 2001), making the Kumbha Mela the largest religious gathering in the world. It may also be the oldest. There are two traditions that determine the origin/location and timing of the festival. The origins of the location of Kumbha Mela are found in ancient texts known as the Puranas, which tell about a battle between gods and demons wherein four drops of nectar (amrita) were supposed to have fallen to earth on these mela sites (Singh and Rana 2002; Feldhaus 2003). The second tradition establishes the timeframe and is connected to astrological phenomena. The following list demonstrates the astrological periods of the four melas and the years of their most recent and near future occurrences:

• Allahabad (Prayaga) — when Jupiter is in Aries or Taurus and the Sun and Moon are in Capricorn during the Hindu month of Magha (January-February): 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001, 2012, 2024.

• Haridvar — when Jupiter is in Aquarius and the Sun is in Aries during the Hindu month of Chaitra (March-April): 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998, 2010, 2021, 2033.


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• Ujjain — when Jupiter is in Leo and the Sun is in Aries, or when Jupiter, the Sun, and the Moon are in Libra during the Hindu month of Vaishakha (April-May); 1968, 1980, 1992, 2004, 2016, 2028, 2040.

• Nasik — when Jupiter and the Sun are in Leo in the Hindu month of Bhadrapada (August-September): 1956, 1968, 1980, 1992, 2003, 2015.

Fig. 1.4. Kumbha Mela sites in India

The antiquity of the Kumbha Mela is shrouded in mystery (Dubey 2001). The Chinese Buddhist pilgrim, Hsuan-tsang, recorded a visit to

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Allahabad in 643 CE in the company of King Harsavardhana and described a tradition of Magha Mela; however, only around the ninth century did it take its present shape under the guidance of the great philosopher Shankaracharya, who had established four monasteries in the north, south, east and west of India, and had called upon the Hindu ascetics, monks and sages to meet at these sites for an exchange of philosophical views. Indologists speculate that between the ninth and twelfth centuries other monks and religious reformers perpetuated and reinforced this periodic assemblage of saints and laypeople at sacred places on the banks of the holy rivers to create an environment of mutual understanding among different religious sects. Additionally, the festival gave laypeople the opportunity to derive benefit from their association with the normally reclusive sages and forest yogis. What was originally a regional festival at Prayag thus became the pre-eminent pan-Indian pilgrimage site.

(ii) Panchakroshi Yatra, Varanasi: experiencing the cosmic

circuit The most sacred city for Hindus, Varanasi (Kashi), has a unique

personality possessing all the important pan-India Hindu sacred places in abbreviated form and spatially transposed in its landscape — hence, the city’s title of ‘cultural capital’ of India (Singh 1993, 1997a,b). The sacred territory (kshetra) of Kashi is delimited by a pilgrimage circuit, known as Panchakroshi.

In an abbreviated form, the Panchakroshi pilgrimage route of Varanasi symbolises the cosmic circuit, the centre of which is the temple of Madhyameshvara and radial point at the shrine of Dehli Vinayaka, covering a distance of 88.5 km (Fig. 1.5). There are 108 shrines and sacred spots along this route, archetypically indicating the integrity of the division of time (e.g. 12 zodiacs) and cardinality of space (nine planets in Hindu mythology, referring to eight directions and the centre). Among the 108 shrines, 56 are related to Shiva (linga). The antiquity of this pilgrimage goes back to the mid-sixteenth century as described in the mythological Puranas (Singh 2003).

The commonly accepted period for this scared journey is believed to be the intercalary month of leap year, commonly known as malamasa. During the last Panchakroshi Yatra in the Ashvina Malamasa (18 September-16 October 2001), a total of 52,310 devout local pilgrims and out-of-town pilgrim-tourists performed this sacred journey. To understand pilgrim-tourist experiences better, a survey was conducted with 432 pilgrimage


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participants by this author during Panchakroshi Yatra (see Singh 1998, 2003). According to the study, travel distance, level of faith, mental preparedness, cultural hierarchy, gender context, and various other life conditions, significantly influence the intensity of the experience. The survey found that small groups (3-6 persons) are the most common social setting for performing Panchakroshi Yatra, which is a finding consistent with Sopher’s (1968) observations in Gujarat (western India). The data also show the dominance of females (66.2 per cent), which supports the perception that Hindu women are ‘more religious’ than men. This reflects to a large extent, the family-based nature of the pilgrimage experience. The majority of pilgrims were from a proximal area surrounding the city and district of Varanasi. In addition, people from Bengal form a significant cohort owing to the fact that Varanasi has been an important settlement destination for Bengalis since the twelfth century.

Fig. 1.5. The Panchakroshi Pilgrimage Circuit in Varanasi

Well over half of the pilgrim-tourists are older people between the ages of 40 and 60. Adolescent devotees usually accompany their parents and grandparents to support and help them, but they also enjoy the fun of leisure pursuits and sightseeing in addition to the religious rituals of the

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pilgrimage. Approximately one fifth of the pilgrims surveyed belong to the lower classes, including peasantry and menial servants. Where education is low and dependency on subsistence farming is high, there is a strong belief in religious and ritualistic activities. Lower educational status is represented by a high percentage of pilgrims and vice versa. More than half (57%) of the foot-pilgrims from the local region claimed to have an education between primary school and graduation (grades 5–10), while among pilgrimage-tourists it is around 70 per cent. The predominance of the Brahmins caste is obvious in the observance of Hindu festivals and ritual performances, for by undertaking these rituals, they rejuvenate their professional images and religious status. The hierarchy of higher-lower caste has a positive correspondence with the frequency of devotees. Brahmins and Merchant castes together share a little over half of the pilgrims (Singh 2003).

Since India’s independence in 1947 the upward mobility of the lower caste has become more notable by their adopting symbols and performing religious activities more typically associated with the higher caste. This tendency has encouraged lower caste people to take part in such sacred journeys, as set fourth in Sanskrit law books and mythical anthologies. These texts explicitly designate pilgrimage as an appropriate meritorious act for poor people, members of the low caste, and women. However, Hindus of the very lowest caste (e.g. untouchables, such as cobblers, pig-herders, sweepers, basket makers, and mouse eaters) almost never make pilgrimages (Morinis 1984: 281). While no noticeable cultural changes have occurred in the Panchakroshi pilgrimage, socio-structural aspects have undergone important changes in the course of time.

Pilgrims enjoy sacred journeys as an earthly adventure from one place to another that entails the combined effects of a spiritual quest and physical hardship — by walking, suffering, or avoiding temptation. Believers often speak of the special power of pilgrimage to uplift them (based upon particular qualities of places) and of the compelling effects of various rituals and rites performed by priests at sacred places (Sax 1991).

(iii) Gaya: the sacred city of ghostscape

Eulogized as the most sacred place for ancestral rituals, the city of

Gaya and its surrounding area claims continuity of tradition at least since the eighth century CE as recounted in the Vayu Purana. The ancient writings mention 324 holy sites and spots related to ancestral rites, of which 84 are presently identifiable and are concentrated in the vicinity of nine sacred clusters (Vidyarthi 1961; cf. Fig. 1.6).


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At present religious travellers most typically visit only 45 of these sites, although three quarters of them perform their ancestral rites at only three places: Phalgu River, Vishnupad and associated sacred centres. The cosmogonic hierarchy is marked by the three territorial layers: Gaya Mandala, Gaya Kshetra, and Gaya Puri, within which there is a complex interweaving of themes of birth, fertility, sun, and death (Singh 1999, also Singh, Malville and Marshall 2009). In the symbolic realm of the cosmic triad, Vishnu’s footprints in the Vishnupad temple serve as the axis mundi, and the cardinal and solstitial points are marked by the hills and other sites of the mandala (Fig. 1.6).

Fig. 1.6. Gaya Mandala

The first clear indication of Gaya as holy place is metaphorically

eulogised in the Rig Veda (1.22.17). The treatise Nirukta, around the eighth century BCE, explains the three most sacred places in Gaya. The glory of Gaya had already been accepted in the period of the Mahabharata, especially for ancestral rites. According to inscriptional

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sources, the antiquity of the site and tradition of ancestral rites in and around the Vishnupad temple goes back to the period of Samudragupta (CE fifth century). The Chinese traveller Hsuan-tsang (seventh century) also mentioned Gaya as a sacred place for bathing, which possesses the power to wash away sins. The name Gaya is derived from a demon-king, Gayasura, who by his arduous austerity, pleased the gods and was blessed that the spirit of all divinities would reside in his body — the territory of Gaya marked by a reclining body. By his power gained from deep meditation, the divine spirit met the earth spirit, resulting in the formation of a very powerful and sacred location. It was this fame that attracted the Buddha to come and perform meditation here. Queen Ahilyabai Holkar of Indore made major sculptural and architectural renovations in Vishnupad temple and other temples in the late eighteenth century.

The three primal objects of nature symbolism described and given ritual connotations are the Phalgu River (‘flowing water’), Akshayavata (‘the imperishable Banyan’) and Pretashila (‘the hill of the ghosts’). The river symbolises fertility by its liquidity (‘living water’) in which life, strength, and eternity are contained. The most common ritual period is the 7-day week, each day of which is prescribed for particular rituals and ancestral rites, combining sacrality with space, time and function. The texts and traditions of Hindu belief systems persuade devotees and to perform ancestral rites at Gaya to help ancestral spirits who, owing to karma or an untimely death, have not yet settled down, to finally achieve a seat in the prescribed abode of manes. This is one of the ideals of Hindus, pursued by the masses, especially in the countryside. As ancestral rites are performed, the spirits of believers’ forbears are released from ghost life, which is riddled with suffering, and they are liberated from endless wandering (moksha). Each year more than a million Hindus visit Gaya to perform ancestral rites.

12. The Prospects: Task ahead

Among the ancient epics, the Mahabharata, dated around the fifth century BCE, is the first source of encouragement for Hindu pilgrimages (tirtha-yatra). The mythologies of the medieval period (puranas) likewise eulogised sacred places. Many works were written later and encourage sacred journeys as well. According to these holy scriptures, the pilgrimage symbolises spiritual progress and is encouraged as a way of letting loose of sins and worldly affairs. Pilgrimage travel is prescribed as a duty to earn spiritual advantages and symbolizes different contexts such as routes, riverbanks, shrines, and venerated sites associated with wise and respected


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sages. According to ancient mythology and the Hindu mind-set there are many types of hallowed places throughout India, but the most important sacred place is Kashi/Varanasi (Banaras), extolled as one of the three ladders to heaven in company with Allahabad and Gaya.

With the growth of global tourism and a widespread interest in seeing culture in the mirror of history and tradition, religious heritage resource management becomes a critical issue in two primary ways: protection and maintenance of sacred sites and the survival and continuity of pilgrimage ceremonies that preserve centuries-old human interactions with the earth and its mystic powers. Fostering a rediscovery of forgotten (or, about so) common cultural heritage and practices at sacred places that centred on reverence to and harmony with the Earth as source and sustainer of life, the conservation and preservation of such holy sites would put a strong step in this direction. There are examples of grand Hindu pilgrimages at the regional level, such as Sabarimalai in Kerala (South India), in which even Christians and Muslims participate (Sekar 1992). Such places are the nexus of cultural integrity. Sopher (1987: 15) has provoked two contrasting messages in Hindu pilgrimage: searching the roots in place as basic religious impulse, and the other ironic form of mental construct of mystical tradition where place has no value. One is free to choose any of the approach, but for understanding the cultural system in both intrinsic and extrinsic ways, or as insider and outsider, a human science paradigm would be better as it covers the totality thus attempting to reveal the “whole” of the culture, human psyche and functions at play. Obviously it is noted that ‘pilgrims, with strong ties to their home places, seek distant destinations of sanctity, and the magnitude of Hindu pilgrimages attest to the strength of this message’ (Sopher 1997: 183).

If Habermasian three-tier typology of science and explanation to be examined together then Hindu pilgrimage studies may be thought of in a better way:

(1) Empirical-analytical approach is based on direct experience, where the ‘facts speak for themselves’; and ultimately it led to develop positivism, e.g. Sopher’s (1968) study. Kevin Lynch (1976: vii) Also to be noted that the diverse ways in which different groups perceive and envision the same place are important for public policy as this the fascinating similarities, arising from features of the environment and the inherent sacrality itself (cf. Rana and Singh 2004: 201).

(2) Hermeneutic approach is based on perception through a system of meanings which are human constructs and developed by each individual process of human contact, resulting to develop

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behavioural network that constantly get transformed and also get other ways transferred into it, e.g. Gold (1988) and Rana & Singh (2004).

(3) Critical approach conceives people as part of culture-world created and manifested by them as ways of ensuing, both individual, day-to-day and collective, generational survival, and motivational movement, e.g. Singh (2000, 2003, 2006), and Coleman and Elsner (1995: 206).

In studying pilgrimage tradition (in India) at least four broad methods

to be used in balanced form are: statistical-spatial, literary-textual, con-textual-experiential, and psychological-linguistic; altogether a multidisc-ciplinary methodology with respect to human science paradigm is required to understand and explain pilgrimage. How spiritual magnetism at a sacred site derives from human concepts and values, via historical, geographical, cultural and faith forces also needs special attention. Turner & Turner (1978) analogy that “pilgrimage is exteriorised mysticism while mysticism is an interior pilgrimage” is still not tested by scholars of pilgrimage or cultural studies. Such study would be benefited with the use of alchemy ― after all we need to understand the ultimate reality and place of human being in cosmos.

13 a. References

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The author

Contact & Corresponding Address:

# New F - 7, Jodhpur Colony; Banaras Hindu University,

Varanasi, UP 221005. INDIA Tel: (+091)-542-2575-843.

Cell/ Mobile: 0-9838 119474 E-mail: [email protected]

Dr. Rana P. B. Singh (b. 15 Dec. 1950), MA, PhD, Professor of Cultural Geography & Heritage Studies at Banaras Hindu University, is the Founding President of the Society of Heritage Planning & Environmental Health, and of the Society of Pilgrimage Studies. He has been involved in studying, performing and promoting the heritage planning and spiritual tourism in the Varanasi region for the last over three decades as researcher, teacher, promoter, collaborator, guide and organiser. On these topics he has given lectures and seminars at various centres in Australia, Austria, Belgium, China PR, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, USA (& Hawaii), USSR. His publications include over 200 research papers and 38 books on different themes, and two regional guidebooks for cultural heritage tourism, like Banaras (Varanasi), Cosmic Order, Sacred City, Hindu Traditions (1993), The Spirit and Power of Place (1994), Banaras Region: A Spiritual & Cultural Guide (2002, with P.S. Rana), Towards pilgrimage Archetypes: Panchakroshi Yatra of Kashi (2002), Where the Buddha Walked (2003), The Cultural Landscape and the Lifeworld: The Literary Images of Banaras (2004), Banaras, the City Revealed (with George Michell, 2005), Banaras, India’s Heritage City: Geography, History, Bibliography (IB 2009), and the eight books under ‘Planet Earth


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& Cultural Understanding Series’: ‒ five from Cambridge Scholars Publishing UK: Uprooting Geographic Thoughts in India (2009), Geographical Thoughts in India: Snapshots and Vision for the 21st Century (2009), Cosmic Order & Cultural Astronomy (2009), Banaras, Making of India’s Heritage City (2009), Sacred Geography of Goddesses in South Asia (2010), and ‒ three from Shubhi Publications (New Delhi, India): Heritagescapes and Cultural Landscapes (2011), Sacredscapes and Pilgrimage Systems (2011), and Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India (2011). _____________________________________________________

[360-11]. Singh, Rana P.B. 2011. Holy Places and Pilgrimages in India: Emerging Trends & Bibliography; in, Singh, Rana P.B. (ed.) Holy Places and Pilgrimages: Essays on India.

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