Mahesh Sharma

State formation and cultural complex in western Himalaya: Chamba genealogy and epigraphs—700-1650 C.E.

This article explores an interface between the cultural complex and state formation in Chamba, emphasising a continuous process of change and transition, forging vertical linkages with the north Indian polity and religious processes that mutated significantly over the long-dur»e. Such linkages were replicated in peripheries as well, which connected them vertically with the nucleus and horizontally with competing segments. Such correlation not only influenced the socio-economic and political structures, but also the normative system through which the society and state viewed itself. The duality of state-society perception sustained alternative sectarian space and symbols that ‘shaped’ and in turn ‘were shaped’, in as much to seek legitimisation as to create a consent for rule over a period of time. That the state crystallised the graded social-cultural identity around religious symbols (text, temple and ritual), kingship and language is critical in comprehending the relationship between the state process and the cultural complex.

Symbols of Empowerment: Possession, Ritual and Healers in Himachal Himalaya (North India)

This article is an attempt to understand ‘locality’, where the issues of subversion, subordination and marginalization as well as the problematic notions of liminality and empowerment are more vibrant and real. We shall demonstrate that while the low castes and untouchables were engaged in economic conflict, at various levels, with the high-caste landowners, which resulted in occasional uprisings too, the popular belief system was used by the marginalized as an instrument of assertion of their power against social coercion. It is argued that the social and ritual protest aimed at diluting or subverting the local caste hierarchy in a stratified society is an efficacious threat to the power of the high castes; that the hope of social revision becomes an alternative to economic subordination. More important, the symbols of empowerment are not the ones controlled by the high castes, but those which are located in the specialized rituals of the marginalized dalits. This article is about these symbols, which are liminal in nature, and how they empower, if only for a brief while, the economically exploited and socially marginalized dalit practitioners.

Marginalisation and appropriation: Jogis, Brahmins and Sidh shrines

caste mobility, arbitrarily known as sanskritisation.’ This process of mimesis, modelled on the ritually highest caste,’ provided a basis for discussion on the effect of values on social change in India while dismantling the myth of Indian villages being a self-sufficient ’isolated whole’.’ However, over the years, the criticism of the process has also mounted,&dquo; especially made polemical by the question of dominant caste and ranking. This is evident from the cropping up of new models as ‘Rajputisation’,5 ‘Kshatriyaisation’,6 6

The frayed margins of empire: Early nineteenth century Panjab and the hill states

The historiography of the nineteenth century Panjab privileges the core constituency of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s ‘empire’, whereby the margins are represented only as conquered territories. This article shifts the perspective by highlighting the context of ‘Zomian’ margins in the making of an ‘empire’. Based on coeval travellers’ accounts, news from Lahore Durbar and British Indian governmental sources, the focus is on the impact of economic and political contingencies on the policies of Sikh Sardars, the Maharaja of Lahore and, ultimately, the British Indian government in the Western Himalayan region. We shall, however, limit ourselves to economic interaction between the hegemonic empire and Kangra hill states to bring out the dynamics of dominance and subversion. The underlying assumption of dominance and eventual integration into the ‘empire’ was rather economic: in services, materials and money. It was, however, not a relationship of political dominance only. While the subjugation of hill states alienated revenue to the ‘empire’, it also opened new markets to the hill products and services that had cultural and economic implications. The new markets were welcomed; the alienation of revenue was not. The alliance, therefore, had an uneasy aspect, nuanced by a subtle protest, that of the weak against the strong: an indirect, meek and symbolic resistance. Consequently, when the strength of ‘empire’ dwindled, such protests acquired accentuated dimensions. The process of such protests is vital in understanding the decline of Lahore ‘empire’, barely a decade after the death of Maharaja Ranjit Singh.

Puranic Texts from Kashmir Vitasta and River Ceremonials in the Nilamata Purana

Focusing on the western Himalayan provinces of Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh, this article argues that the Indian hagiographic texts of the Puranas should be understood as a nuanced literature that sought to effect a paradigm shift in liturgy and praxis, fusing polity and religion, largely in contravention to the earlier Vedic–Upanishadic texts and their commentaries, but also building on them. Emphasis on local Sanskrit literature, specifically the Nilamata Purana, which uses popular iconographies of river goddesses, served many centuries ago to reconstruct the geography of the area within the wider context of the subcontinental sacred geography. Keeping within the Puranic tradition, the article focuses on the rituals and ceremonials associated with rivers, while also charting the process by which regional pilgrim centres were formed on their banks, devising a sacred space parallel to the subcontinental cosmos. This reinforces the logic of the sacred river, the worshipped deity, as a process by which brahmanic dominance was asserted in the peripheral areas of early India, or ideologically and politically contested regions such as Kashmir. In the sacrality of the river Vitasta, Brahmanism as an ideology reasserts itself by restating the tradition in relation to its sacral past, creating a new sacred space and devising a sacred icon to reclaim this particular geography for the devout Brahmanas.

Making the Deity: Woman Sacrifice, Goddess and Patriarchy

The social milieu of an Indian Himalayan village typifies a complex relationship between the belief system and society. Each village had its own tutelary deity (grama-devata) usuaily venerated by a fair (mela) or ceremony to mark its auspicious or sacred time. The set of fairs provided an opportunity to exchange the agrarian products against non-local essential commodities, for instance, salt, tobacco, wool, cattle, etc. More significant for the village was the propitiation of the deities that in their perception sustained them. The fair was only a part of the larger sustenance strategy.