Religious Complexity in Northeastern South Asia

geocurrents.info/cultural-geography/religion/religious-complexity-in-northeastern-south-asia

Martin W. Lewis
Northeastern South Asia has one of the worlds most
complex religious environments, and such complexity is
captured nicely in Scolbert08s amazing map of world
religions. To illustrate this, I have posted a detail from this
map of this region, both in annotated and non-annotated
form, along with a smaller version of the same map
juxtaposed with other maps of the same general area.
The strongly Christian areas of far eastern India stand out
clearly on Scolbert08s map. Protestantism, represented
mostly by the Presbyterian and Baptist churches, dominates
here, but the state of Meghalaya also has an area of Roman
Catholic plurality. Most of Indias northeastern Christians are
of tribal background, and hence were never incorporated
into the Hindu world. Manipur, which has a Hindu plurality,
forms a religious exception in this part of India. In the early
modern period, Manipur was a strong Hindu kingdom,
supported by a powerful cavalry. But Hinduism is prevalent
only in the states central plain, which also has a small zone
of Islam, whereas the uplands of Manipur are dominated by
Protestant Christians. The state as a whole is 46 percent
Hindu, 34 percent Christian, and 9 percent Muslim.

Arunachal Pradesh in the far northeast, which China claims

as South Tibet, is strikingly heterogeneous in terms of
religion, as it is in regard to language, with some 30 to 50
separate ethnolinguistic groups. Some of the people of Arunachal Pradesh have converted to Protestant
Christianity, whereas others remain animists. Buddhism, of
both the Theravada and Tibetan Mahayana branches, are
also well represented in the state, as is Hinduism. The 2010
India census gives the following breakdown for Arunachal
Pradesh: Christian: 418,732 (30.26%); Hindu: 401,876
(29.04%); Others (mostly Donyi-Polo): 362,553 (26.2%);
Buddhist: 162,815 (11.76%); Muslim: 27,045 (1.9%); Sikh:
1,865 (0.1%); Jain: 216 (<0.1%). The Donyi-Polo category is
particularly interesting, as it represents an eort to retain
traditional beliefs and practices by transforming them into an
organized religion. As explained in the Wikipedia:
Donyi-Polo (also Donyi-Poloism) is the designation
given to the indigenous religions, of animistic and shamanic type, of the Tani and other TibetoBurman peoples of Arunachal Pradesh, in north-eastern India. The name Donyi-Polo means
Sun-Moon, and was chosen for the religion in the process of its revitalisation and
institutionalisation started in the 1970s in response to the coercive proselytization of Christianity
and the possibility of absorption into Hinduism.

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The religion has developed a congregational system, hymns to be sung composed in the Tani
ritual language of shamans, a formalised philosophy-theology and iconography of the gods and
temples.

A similar movement is underway in the tribal belt of the Chota Nagpur Plateau in the Indian state of Jharkhand,
where the new/old faith of Sarnaism is gaining strength. As explained in a dierent Wikipedia article:
Sarnaism or Sarna (local languages: Sarna Dhorom, meaning Religion of the Holy Woods)
denes the indigenous religions of the Adivasi populations of the states of Central-East India,
such as the Munda, the Ho, the Santali, the Khuruk, and others. During, colonial rule it was
subsumed as a folk form of Hinduism, in recent decades followers have started to develop an
identity, and more recently even an organisation, distinct from Hinduism, similarly to other tribal
religious movements such as Donyi-Polo or Sanamahism.
Sarnaist followers have been organising protests and petitions to have their religion recognised
by the government of India in census forms.[ In 2013 Sarnaist followers have organised a protest
against use of indigenous imagery by Christians in order to attract converts.
Evidently, Christians in the Chota Nagpur region have been attracting converts in recent years. As the map
shows, some parts of this region have clear Roman Catholic majorities. Catholicism has a long history in this
area, dating back to the actions of Flemish Jesuit missionaries in the late 1800s. According to a recent article in
ACN-USA News, Catholic beliefs and practices have been important factors in drawing tribal peoples to the
Catholic Church in north-east India, where Christianity has grown phenomenally. I would, however, like to see
more solid data on this phenomenon.

Other interesting and important features are also evident on Scolbert08s map. One example is the fairly solid
belt of Buddhism (Theravada) in the Chittagong Hills of southeastern Bangladesh. Although Buddhism is rarely
associated with Bangladesh, up to a million Bangladeshis adhere to this faith. At one time, Buddhism was
common if not prevalent over the area that now constitutes Bangladesh, but the religion survived only in the
more remote upland tracks of the southeast. (Throughout northeastern South Asia, upland areas correlate with
religious minorities.) Bangladesh also has some Hindu majority districts in the southwest, a pattern that
generates political complications. As explained in a Wikipedia article:
Despite their dwindling numbers, Hindus [in Bangladesh] still yield considerable inuence
because of their geographical concentration in certain regions. They form a majority of the
electorate in at least two parliamentary constituencies (Khulna-1 and Gopalganj-3) and account
for more than 25% in at least another twenty. For this reason, they are often the deciding factor in
parliamentary elections where victory margins can be extremely narrow. It is also frequently
alleged that this is a prime reason for many Hindus being prevented from voting in elections,
either through intimidating actual voters, or through exclusion in voter list revisions (e.g., see
Daily Star, 4 January 2006).

As a nal point, it is noteworthy that the Rohingya Muslim area of Burma (Myanmar) along the border with
Bangladesh is not evident on the map. As most Rohingya have been denied citizenship in Burma, they are

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evidently not counted in enumerations of religious belief.

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