Examples of Cognitive Dissonance in the Work of Meera Nanda
Meera Nanda has written a book titled “God Market How Globalisation is Making India More Hindu” in English. The book not only is selective in exposition, it is contradictory. Text on same page, same chapter or in different chapters contradict each other. She writes
All quotations and facts and figures cited in the book are backed by complete references provided in the notes at the end of the book. Readers are invited to follow along by matching the first few words of a sentence with the correct page number listed in the notes. Those interested in further reading will find the Bibliographic Essay useful.
The bibliography has no reference to any book on Hindu religion, practice, or rituals. Yet she claims to be doing scholarship work. As mentioned in an earlier article, Sanskar Praksh is a book about Hindu rituals. It is easily available from Gita Press shops at railway stations. Other foundational books of Hindu religion are also available there.
But that would be scholarship. Nanda is writing jeremiad not a research paper. That requires no bibliography at all.
Globalization
She writes that globalization is making ‘all religions more religious’ in Chapter 1 at Page 2 of the book. Another awkward phrase used by her. See:
“Globalization is making the whole world more religious—and all religions more political.”
But contradicts the above statement on next page. On page 3 of Chapter 1, she singles out Hindu religion as uniquely problematic. She writes:
“Hinduism has become the de facto religion of the ‘secular’ Indian state.”
One may wonder why such contradiction exists. When something is global how a local phenomenon is strange? It is like saying
“It is raining everywhere. The surprise is that I am wet.”
It appears to me that Nanda conducted no personal study or original research. Perhaps she assembled clippings rather than coherent analysis. She gathered negative reporting on Hindu religion from various sources. She clips paragraphs and pastes them on her canvas. Later she or perhaps editors rearranged the text in more coherent order. But the contradictions remain visible.
In any case, she has no problem with certain parallels elsewhere. The President of USA takes oath on Bible. After taking the oath, the President pays a visit to church. The King of England serves as head of Church of England. Clergy sit as members of House of Lords. The coronation of the King is performed by a priest. These entanglements of religion and state pass without her criticism. Only the Hindu religion’s relationship with the Indian state triggers her alarm. The double standard is obvious.
Hypocrisy on Rituals.
According to Meera Nanda, the rise of rituals means political danger. But she does not care to explain that rituals exist in every society and country. She has the same logic as criticizing a human being for having two eyes and one nose by calling it a unique feature. It appears there are admirers of her verdict who do not care for reasoning. She writes to feed this narrative. See page 5 and 6 of “Chapter 2: Rush Hour of the Gods” where she states:
“This religiosity is becoming more and more public and political… religious rituals like yagnas and yatras are becoming mobilizing tools for political causes… meant to consolidate a majority Hindu consciousness.”
She is blind to the fact that yagna and yatras have existed for millennia. But she cares not for facts or knowledge. She panders to ignorant masses who do not know that these practices existed for thousands of years. Yagna is part of the Vedic tradition. Four Vedas are repositories of knowledge. Yagna is part of the Rig Veda.
As regards yatra, the numbers speak for themselves. The Kumbh at Prayagraj in 2024 drew 45 crore or 450 million people. That is one and a half times the entire population of USA, Nanda’s host country. Her warnings fell on deaf ears. During Kumbh, rishis and sanyasis who dwell in remote forests and mountains come down to refresh memory with civilizational changes. They convey original practices of rituals. These gatherings preserve and transmit ancient knowledge across generations. These are like backup servers running rsync on Linux computer.
She may denounce Yoga too. Patanjali Yoga Sutra is stated to be older than Buddha. All contemporary gurus and teachers follow the same tradition.
Hindu Nationalism
The book argues Hindu nationalism is dangerous and new. But she misunderstands what she observes. In Chapter 3 at Page 7 she writes:
“Chapter 3… describes the nexus between the state, the temples, and the private sector… and looks at the phenomenon of banal or everyday Hindu nationalism… the worship of the nation is becoming indistinct from the worship of Hindu gods and goddesses.”
She has never bothered to listen to the priest. She has never participated in puja herself. The puja starts with mention of the cosmos, then earth, then continent, then country, city, address and gotra. The puja ends with Om Shanti or peace for earth, vegetation, humanity, and all creatures. Therefore, reverence for nation has been part of prayers for millennia. It is not new. It is eternal.
Religions always venerate intermediaries between human and divine. The religions Nanda knows of venerate prophets as those intermediaries. Hindus venerate nation and cosmos as sacred rather than human messengers.
Nanda is herself a prophet of rationalism as explained in previous article. Therefore, she has no problems with prophets. Her problem is with nation.
The devastating irony:
She interprets puja through Abrahamic lens of worship (lower to higher). She sees Hindus doing puja to nation and thinks “they’re worshipping the state like a god.” She misses that it’s acknowledgment of Brahman expressing through nation, cosmos, lineage.
No messenger needed because there’s no separation. You don’t need a prophet to connect you to what you already are.
Nanda positions herself as prophet warning the fallen. But Hindus don’t accept the premise that they’re separated from the divine and need her warnings. This enrages her more than anything else.
People Became more Religious
“More” is a strange comparative. More than what? Perhaps she means the past. My guess is that earlier she was not looking. Like she missed the puja. She writes at page 69-70 of Chapter 2
“Urban educated Indians are more religious than their rural and illiterate counterparts… religiosity has increased more in small towns and cities than in villages.”
When was the last time she had been to a village? When was the last time she traveled by train in India? Trains carry people from rural India. She had no connection with rural India to make that sweeping remark.
People like Nanda who grew up in Chandigarh have a peculiar upbringing. They do not travel by train. Chandigarh is on a railway loop line, a dead end at Kalka station. Broad gauge trains terminate there. From there a toy train on narrow gauge goes uphill to Shimla. The train station is far away. Bus stand is right in the middle of city and buses are good. People develop preference for buses as mode of travel. Traveling in long distance trains in non-AC compartments often results in experiencing rural India. Chandigarh’s railway geography makes this experience unlikely. Nanda likely never had this experience.
Harmonious Schizophrenics
Finally she sees the mirror and finds her illness but she projects it upon others. She uses a term “harmonious schizophrenics” in Chapter 2 at Page 71 in these words:
“Indians are well known for being harmonious schizophrenics who live in many different worlds at the same time. Most educated Indians seem to switch effortlessly from the profane to the sacred, from the lab to the temple and back, without being troubled by the contradictions between the operative beliefs in the two spheres.”
She bases this on Milton Singer’s 1972 book “When a Great Tradition Modernizes.” But Singer ADMIRED what Nanda condemns. Singer praised India’s unique cultural metabolism. He saw compartmentalization as allowing Indians to modernize without destroying their tradition. What Singer called exceptional adaptability, Nanda calls schizophrenia.
First of all schizophrenia is a personality disorder. Different personas exists in a schizophrenic person. Thus, it is clinically wrong, But let us assume she meant something similar to people playing different roles at different times. She, a solo Prophet of Rationality finds it schizophrenic.
Secondly, her position reminds me a political joke. When Morarji Desai’s name was being discussed as Prime Minster of India in 1977, one politician told another: “Do you know Morarji Bhai? Look at that lamp post. That is Morarji. Straight, upright and unbending.” He was proven right. The government fell in 2 years. Janta Party itself was disintegrated. Some blame it on rag-tag combination but the person in command was Morarji who could not keep all factions together.
Nanda is like that lamp post. She wants the whole world full of lamp posts. All standing tall and lighting the world like holy prophet. She finds harmony a bad word yet she does not dress like Americans even after living there at least for two decades. That society has embraced her. She loved that harmony. She hates India’s harmony.
The State–Temple–Corporate Complex
In Chapter 3 at Page 6–7 she writes:
“The rise in Hindu religiosity can be explained by the emergence of the ‘state–temple–corporate complex’… public funds… are increasingly being diverted into facilitating the work of these private charitable institutions which bear a distinctly Hindu traditionalist bias.”
Where was she when Juggilal Kamlapat or JK group was building temples? Where was she when Birla Mandirs were built in several cities? Perhaps she was not born yet.
All this happened with the permission of the Government of the day. Both built sprawling temples. Today temples are built by public charities not by business houses.
What about the Hindu Temples in USA. There are at least 16 grand temples in USA. A new Temple was recently built in Abu Dhabi. These are not just places of worship. These are places of veneration and a connection to Hindu traditions. These also serve as cultural centers.
She has a problem with western non-religious education imparted in schools or colleges sponsored by Temples. She has no issue with Madrasas attached to Mosques imparting religious education. She has no problem in Christian Schools imparting teachings of Christianity as Moral Science in every school run by them. I had no problem with their teaching when I was school. They imparted good values. My children now grown up, too had same experience in school. We have not felt any scorn against church. Why is Nanda so scornful?
Exclusive White Mouse Study
She explicitly admits that only Hindus will be studied for religiosity in India. Why this special treatment? She writes at page 4 of “Chapter: Introduction”
“This book is about Hinduism and not about organized movements for Hindutva… Muslims, Christians, and other non-Hindus will not be investigated in any detail.”
If she wants to study the religiosity in India, how it can be studied by studying the Hindu religious practices and religion? The sight of Namaz offering on roads is not religiosity? Christmas celebrations in every nook and corner is to be ignored? People visiting Hindu temples on New Year is religiosity that has to be discouraged? Hindu is a white mouse which requires special study and analysis from the Prophet of Rationality.
Pseudo-Science
She treats Hindu Scientific Claims as Pseudo-Science. At page 59 of Chapter 2 she writes
“Educated Indians have shown a huge appetite for the pseudo-scientism being taught by neo-Hindu philosophers… all the metaphysical concepts of traditional Hinduism… are accepted as if they are backed by scientific evidence.”
Nanda is not the kind of person with whom to discuss Ayurveda, Astronomy or Mathematics. She is not concerned if science is there or not. If she wanted she could easily find in Eastern Sciences section of any library. Her problem is why people are searching it and why they are proud of it. This is also same problem. Every religious or ethnic groups like to have reason to be proud of their past. The fact does not matter. People have found Science in Quran and Bible as well. There is nothing unique about it.
Thus, the Hindu middle class has abandoned scientific temper. In Chapter 2 at page 69 she states:
“Rather than cultivating a habit of critical thinking… educated Indians show an appetite for pseudo-scientism.”
President Macron of France is ignorant when he gives an interview in 2025 at the sidelines of Summit on Artificial Intelligence. He was being appreciative of the fact that India produces one million engineers every year, more than the number produced by entire world. He should have accepted the word of Prophet of Rationality that India has no scientific temper.
Religion in Public
Authoritarianism of its own kind is advocated by Nanda. According to her Public Hinduism is Dangerous but Private Hinduism is no problem. in Chapter 2 she writes at page 62–63
“What has changed is that the ritualistic aspects have moved from the privacy of the home… to the public sphere, the domain of pride and prejudice, politics, and profits.”
Unfortunately she is wrong. Hindu wedding is famous in its pomp and show. Barat is not the only feature. The vedic hawan is always conducted in public. Festivals like Holi and Diwali are always performed in public. You can not burst fire cracker inside home. It would be dangerous. Public celeberations of religion is documented by Al-Beruin in 1030AD. But scholars make reasearch not jeremaid writers like Nanda. In the guise of scholarship, she is advocating a dangerous kind of authoritarian ban on festivities which is not practiced anywhere in the world,
Charity
Under caption “The Indian Middle Class: A Snapshot” at page 67 she writes:
Indian elite and middle classes display an exceptionally high degree of tolerance for the inhuman levels of poverty and deprivation all around them, a trait that could well derive from the hindu conception of karmic justice and the individualistic conception of salvation or moksha in hinduism. to be sure, when asked, an overwhelming proportion—92 per cent in the Pew poll—say they want the state to step in and help the poor. This is an outright falsehood. Millions of people are fed daily from charity kitchens in millions of Temples and Gurudwaras. On special occasions people set up kiosks of food stall and distribute free food on road side. In summer Free lassi and sharbat is distributed to pedestrians. I think Nanda does not know how to use computers of Google Search. If she searched, she would have discovered these facts. Orphanages maintain diary for booking charity. If you want to serve freshly cooked food, you have to book in advance. In most of orphanages there is booking for months if not years. On some dates it could be booked for many years in advance.
Special Status to Muslims
Nanda explicitly states that only Hindus will be analysed in her book. In the Chapter: Introduction at page 4, she writes:
“This book is about Hinduism and not about organized movements for Hindutva… Muslims, Christians, and other non-Hindus will not be investigated in any detail.”
Her protectiveness of Muslims is again reflective in Chapter 4. At page 1–2 she states:
“The extreme conservatism of some Muslims… is made to stand for the entire Islamic world community. But the accomplishments of India… are claimed for the glory of Hinduism.”
The hypocrisy is glaring. A few sample of small number of Muslims do not make a case for majority but her observation of a few Hindu persons is sufficient to draw a general conclusion. She frequently refers to survey by Pew Research which is also a sample survey.
It is no coincidence that a summary of her book is prepared in Islamabad by these persons of CSP Research:
Book Summary by CSPs Research Team Ali Dost & Aimal Khushal
CSPs Academy, G-10 Markaz, Islamabad
Is this the organization financing her work? We will look into financial aspects of her writing and her psycology in next article.
After leaving her professional training in biology, Nanda enters the study of Hinduism not as a participant or inheritor of its lived institutions, but as an external observer dependent on secondary Western accounts. The reliance itself is revealing: what is routine to those who live within Hindu society appears to her only as something to be “discovered” through visitors’ descriptions.
The result is a double insulation. In India, she lived within a narrow urban-intellectual cocoon. In the West, she inhabits an academic cocoon. In neither location does she engage Hindu civilization as it is actually practiced, transmitted, or sustained.
Airplanes on Airport
Nanda has devised a method to display her research. She reads books and is surprised by what she read about India. Then she shares the surprise as a discovery of something new. She is Alice who is wandering through Hindu land but by reading accounts written by other visitors. At page 171 she quotes Fullar:
Another priest training school in Pillaiyarpatti in tamil Nadu is run by K. Pitchai Gurukkal, and with 250 students, it is considered the largest in the country. Both Fuller and other commentators describe hands-on training in rituals, combined with training in astrology, sanskrit grammar, and devotional singing. the special feature of this school is the emphasis on practical training from early on. the students, even the youngest among them, earn their tuition by assisting the teachers in conducting yagnas and prayers in temples and private homes. Priest students are trained in re-enacting the fire rituals exactly, literally, and in the same detail as they are prescribed in the Vedas. the popular Ganpati homa (yagna for Ganesha) performed by the priests-in-training involves 21 people, 16 to recite the correct number of mantras and five for adding oblations to the fire. Rather than simplifying the ceremonies, the emphasis is on ‘flawless execution’ of elaborate details.
She presents this description as academic discovery. But the details match almost exactly a 2003 article from Hinduism Today magazine titled “Keeping the Faith.” The article was a feature story about Dr. K. Pitchai Gurukkal’s priest training school. Nanda cites this as if from academic source C.J. Fuller. But Fuller wrote about Minakshi Temple in Madurai, not Pillaiyarpatti. She appears to have read a religious magazine, borrowed its descriptions, and repackaged them as scholarly observation. This is not research. This is clipping and pasting, exactly as suspected.
The tone of discovery is misplaced. The existence of priest-training gurukuls is no more surprising than the existence of airplanes at an airport. Temples presuppose trained priests; training presupposes institutions. Treating this as novelty only reveals unfamiliarity with how the system actually works.
She has been to Delhi. From there, Haridwar and Rishikesh are a short drive away. Anyone can ask for the address of a nearby ashram. One can visit personally and see how priests are trained. This is not a secret operation. It runs on public charity, openly and continuously. One may even donate if one wishes.
These were a few quotes to prove the point of her cognitive dissonance. The entire book has same problem. She is merely telling people that she read a book in which there were airplanes on airport.
Every civilization faces its Kalnemis. Those who wear the robes of sages while serving obstructionist agendas. Those who speak the language of scholarship while practicing sabotage. Nanda has chosen her role. Readers must choose whether to be deceived.
Notes and References:
Aham Brahmasmi:
ब्रह्म वा इदमग्र आसीत्तदात्मानमेवावेत्, अहं ब्रह्मास्मीति। तस्मात्तत्सर्वमभवत्तद्यो यो देवानां रत्यबुध्यत स एव तदभवत्तथर्षीणां तथा मनुष्याणाम्… बृहदारण्यक उपनिषद (1.4.10)
Science in Quran: https://quranica.com/articles/quranic-verses-about-science-and-technology/
Scientific Facts in Quran: https://themuslimvibe.com/faith-islam/13-scientific-facts-in-the-holy-quran
Science in Bible: https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/encyclopedia-of-the-bible/Science-Bible
Al-Beruin’s India: An Account of the Religion, Philosophy, Literature, Geography, Chronology, Astronomy, Customs, Laws, and Astrology of India about 1030AD. https://archive.org/details/alberunisindia_201612
Nanda’s visit to Delhi mentioned in EPW dated October 18, 2008
Meera Nanda “God Delusion at Work: My Indian Travel Diary” Economic Political Weekly 2008: https://www.epw.in/journal/2008/42/commentary/god-delusion-work-my-indian-travel-diary.html
Fight faith based Politics: https://independent.academia.edu/MeeraNanda
The God Market: https://www.academia.edu/65857600/The_God_Market_How_Globalization_is_Making_India_More_Hindu