‘You can’t be a good neighbour with tolerance alone’

What’s special about Janmashtami there?
(Laughs) Krishna! Vrindavan. The intimate atmosphere of worship, typical of north India. Even at Kashi Vishwanath, you can go right in, touch everything. It’s different in south India—a sense of more restricted access to the deity. In Kedarnath, they have both: in the elaborate evening arati, you have to go through the priest. But in the morning, you can go right in. It’s as though nirgun (the universal) and sagun (the particular) are both given time.

Your mantras are words like ‘‘inclusivism’’ and ‘‘pluralism’’. Please explain them.
Inclusivism is benign to other faiths but it basically believes that its own point of view is best. The unsettling element here is that it dodges the question of real difference by finally reducing everything to the religious language of one tradition. Pluralism is an interpretation of plurality, of religious and cultural diversity. Plurality is the diversity, active participation in this diversity, not just standing and watching. It’s not simply tolerance but the seeking of understanding. You can’t be a good neighbour with tolerance alone, it does not remove our ignorance of one another.

How does your Pluralism Project help in this delicate business?
We document everything that happens and see the patterns. Pluralistic dialogue can happen intra-religiously, too. In Nashville, which is the heart of American country and blue grass music, when the Hindu community got large enough, they came together to build a temple. Gujaratis, Tamils, UP-walas and Bengalis encountered their own diversity. They had to satisfy themselves as Hindus and also satisfy the American civic system. They had to elect a board, with a chairman and a committee. And they sent out a ballot on which deity should occupy the sannidhi (main shrine). Everyone voted for Ganesha and so it’s called the SriGanesha Temple, Nashville. When Fairfax County Hindus put up a Durga temple, the County Commissioners declared a Durga Temple Appreciation Week. The Mayor read out a declaration on the contribution of Hindus to Fairfax County. This is symbolic recognition that ‘‘We, the people’’ of America are not monolithic, that we welcome diversity, ever since the landmark change in immigration law in 1965, which altered our religious landscape dramatically.

Are you up-to-date with Hindutva vis-a-vis Hinduism?
In my upcoming book, I go a lot into Hindu sacred geography, into the pilgrim circuits. The interesting thing is, no place stands alone! Each one is linked to so many others in a vast network, through series that accommodate other series. So you have 12 Jyotirlingas, 108 Shaktipeeths, many Kashis and Gangas, the six temples of Murugan, the Vaishnava circuit, the Braj Mandal. All of them represent each other.

This is central to Hinduism: the One in the Many, which is also the US national motto—E Pluribus Unum. In Hinduism, it’s summed up in the saying Kashi ke kankar Shankar samaan. ‘‘Each pebble in Kashi represents Shiva’’ and that’s why pilgrims take them away and recreate their own Kashis. Which is why I’m most distressed that Ayodhya, which exists everywhere in multiple forms, is being reduced to the singular. In any case, the main attention in Ayodhya was always for the Panchkroshi circuit around the city and the Hanuman garhi, while several sites in Ayodhya itself claim to be the Janmabhoomi.