MEERA NANDA-Frontline

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Sanitising after a prayer session at the BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, also known as the Neasden Temple, in London on July 3. Ram Navami pujas were live-streamed by BAPS Swaminarayan temples in all continents of the world during the lockdown.

Puja in the time of pandemic

Devotional Hinduisim has been quick to use technology in its pursuit of spirituality, with worshippers staying safe at home while performing their rit

FILE- In this Wednesday, Oct. 5, file 2016 photo, Indian spiritual guru, who calls himself Saint Dr. Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Ji Insan, arrives for a press conference ahead of the release of his new film 'MSG, The Warrior Lion Heart,' in New Delhi, India. Several cities in north India were under a security lock down Thursday ahead of a verdict in a rape trial involving the controversial and hugely popular spiritual leader. (AP Photo/Tsering Topgyal, File)

Godmen’s own country

The Dera Sacha Sauda fiasco is a classic example of the state-temple-business nexus and what ensues when the basic social functions of the state are “

Hindutva’s science envy

Claiming an organic unity between the Vedic world view and modern science has been the agenda of Hindu nationalists from the very start. If modern sci

Police escort spiritual leader Asaram Bapu (L) outside an airport after his arrest in Jodhpur, in India's desert state of Rajasthan September 1, 2013. Police arrested Bapu from India's central Madhya Pradesh state late on Saturday night and transited him to neighbouring Rajasthan for further questioning on charges of sexual assault on a minor. REUTERS/Stringer (INDIA - Tags: RELIGION CRIME LAW)

In the name of faith

Asaram Bapu’s alleged sexual assault on a young girl offers an opportunity to throw light on India’s superstition industry and lift the veil on the st

Students who secured the Degree of Vidyavaridhi (PhD) at the first convocation of the Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan in New Delhi, deemed to be a university in May 2002, on June 29, 2005.-SHANKER CHAKRAVARTY

Producing priests

WHAT is good for the market is proving to be good for the gods in India. The more material acquisitions the middle classes make, the more pujas and ho

A MARCH 1966 picture of Martin Luther King.-THE HINDU PHOTO LIBRARY

Affirmative action and caste dilemmas

Indian businesses are taking a skewed view of `affirmative action' in the U.S. to sell a strategy that is big on promises and low on accountability.

SWAMI RAMDEV. The many miraculous cures he promises, and the 'scientific' evidence he cites for them, offer a window into the sad state of scientific research in Ayurveda.-V.V. KRISHNAN

Ayurveda under the scanner

The efficacy and safety of Ayurvedic drugs, especially those claiming to provide miraculous cures, need to be subjected to scientific scrutiny.

The International Society of Krishna Consciousness, which propagates the theory of Vedic creationism, is a big hit in the West. Here, Western devotees at a religious gathering organised by ISKCON in Allahabad.-

Vedic creationism in America

Vedic creationism is attracting friendly attention from both the old-fashioned Biblical creationists and the new-fangled intelligent design theorists.

Is India a science superpower?

On the radical disconnect between the dreams of becoming a science superpower and the grim reality of mind-numbing superstitions and life-threatening

Postmodernism, Hindu nationalism and `Vedic science'

The second and concluding part of the two-part article.