Preparing for the next census

“Religion?” he asked.

“Madhuism”, I replied without hesitation.

He glanced at the questionnaire and after a second of hesitation, he said: “There is not religion like that”.

“Yes, there is”, I smiled. “I am the only one practicing it”.

“Hindu”. He turned back to the questionnaire to mark the relevant column.

“This country has no religious freedom now”, I said.

Guru Nanak and his followers created Sikhism during the Mughal period by combining Hinduism that was already transformed by Buddhist and Jain thoughts with elements of Islam. But in this day and age, I am not allowed to create a religion by combining Sufi and Zen traditions? I was pissed off.

The Haryanavi school teacher who was taking the census was not perturbed. Life among cows and buffaloes does that to you. He went on to the next column in the questionnaire.

***

The Lingayat issue in Karnataka gives me hope. I can now try and assert my religion.

But of course, Madhuism won’t work. The religion explicitly forbids any other follower. So it cannot have the political clout, like the Lingayats had.

But I won’t be covered into the Hindu fold by the next school teacher who comes to take census. I am not a Hindu. I don’t have the pride, the hate, the stridency of the Hindus. And Trump does not love me.

So I will declare myself a Shaivite and insist that the next census allows me my religious freedom. I want myself to be recorded as a Shaivite and NOT as a Hindu.

I request the other citizens who do not hate Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Jews or Zorastrians, in spite of not belonging to any of these religions, to support me. 

Let me please be a Shaivite and not a Hindu. I don’t accept Krishna and Rama as gods, but definitely as characters in great stories. I enjoy them perhaps more than Frodo and Gandalf.

***

Being a shaivite has great benefits.

Swayam bhoo Mahadeva.

My self-generated god, please help me face the next census with an assertion of my religious freedom.