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Ahmedabad, April 10 (Indian Express): The Gujarat government has issued a circular clarifying that Buddhism has to be considered a separate religion and any conversions from Hinduism to Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism would require prior approval of the district magistrate concerned under the provisions of the Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act, 2003.
The circular was issued by the Home department on April 8 after it came to the notice of the government that applications seeking conversion to Buddhism were not being dealt with as per rules. The circular was signed by Deputy Secretary (Home) Vijay Badheka.
In Gujarat, every year, mostly Dalits have been seen converting en masse to Buddhism at events held on Dussehra and other festivals.
The circular stated that it has come to notice that offices of district magistrates are arbitrarily interpreting the Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act. “…it has come to notice that in applications seeking permission for conversion from Hinduism to Buddhism, procedure as per rules are not being followed. Moreover, sometimes, representations are being received from applicants and autonomous bodies that for religious conversion from Hinduism to Buddhism, prior permission is not required,” it added.
“In cases where applications are filed seeking prior permission, concerned offices are disposing such applications while stating that under Article 25(2) of the Constitution, Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism are included within Hinduism and so the applicant is not required to take permission for (such) religious conversion,” the circular stated.
“It is possible that the replies given to applicants in sensitive subject like religious conversion without sufficient study of legal provisions can result in judicial litigations,” it added.
The circular mentioned that “with reference to Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act, Buddhism will have to be considered a separate religion”. It added that as per the Act, the person who is getting another to convert from Hinduism to Budhhism/Sikhism/Jainism will have to take prior permission of the district magistrate in a prescribed format. Also, the person who is converting will have to inform the district magistrate in a prescribed format.
It further instructed the district magistrates to decide application of religious conversion after detailed study of the legal provisions and by following instructions issued by the state government time to time.
A senior Home department official said the circular has been issued as a clarification on the subject. “Some district magistrates were wrongly interpreting the Act and its rules while deciding applications of the religious conversion from Hinduism to Budhhism. Also, some district magistrates had sought guidance on the subject. So, we have issued the clarification through this circular,” the official added.
In Gujarat, the trend of converting to Buddhism is prevalent among Dalits. The Gujarat Buddhist Academy (GBA) is one of the prominent organisations that holds such conversion events regularly in the state.
The Secretary of GBA, Ramesh Banker, welcomed the circular. “This circular has made it clear that Buddhism is a separate religion and it has nothing to do with Hinduism. The confusion was created by (some in the) administration while misinterpreting the law. We believed from the beginning that Buddhism is not a part of Hinduism and for conversion to Buddhism, prior permission of the district magistrate is mandatory in a prescribed format. It was our demand (to issue such a clarification), which has been fulfilled.”
“In our conversion events, we have always followed procedure, taking prior permission of the concerned district magistrate by filling up a prescribed form,” he added.
The form has to be submitted to the district magistrate one month before the conversion event by the ‘dharmguru’ (religious head) under whom the conversion would take place. In the form, details of the person(s) to be converted are to be submitted, including name, address, community, whether they belong to Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe, marital status, occupation, monthly income, the time since when he is following the religion from which he is converting, reasons for conversion, venue and date of the conversion event and the name of the dharmguru who will perform the conversion, among others.
Banker said that in 2023, at least 2,000 people, mainly Dalits, converted to Buddhism. As per Census 2011 data, there are 30,483 Buddhists in Gujarat – 0.05 per cent of the state’s population. Buddhists in Gujarat have argued that the actual number of Buddhists is not reflected because Census officials record them as Hindus.
On October 25, last year, around 400 people converted to Buddhism in Ahmedabad. Similarly, in October 2022, around 900 people converted to Buddhism in Gir Somnath. The prominent Dalits from Gujarat who embraced Buddhism in the recent past include the victims of 2016 Una public flogging – Vashram Sarvaiya, Ramesh Sarvaiya and their family members.
The Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act was brought by the government to check religious conversion through allurement, force or misrepresentation or any other fraudulent means. In 2021, the state government amended the Act prohibiting forcible religious conversion by marriage.
It has provisions like maximum punishment of up to 10 years in jail and fine up to Rs 5 lakh. The burden of proof lies on the accused and such matters are to be investigated by an officer not below the rank of deputy superintendent of police. The amended Act stands challenged before Gujarat High Court, where the matter is pending.
Why Buddhism invites Dalits
The conversion of 300 Dalits to Buddhism in Una, Gujarat in 2018, was not the first such instance. The Indian Express looks at previous mass conversions by Dalits and the pressures that have forced them to convert.
Scores of Dalits convert to Buddhism in Gujarat There have been numerous instances in recent years where Dalits, individually, families and in large groups, have embraced Buddhism. (Illustration: C R Sasikumar)
On Sunday, members of a Dalit family that had been targeted by cow vigilantes in Una, Gujarat, in July 2016, and nearly 300 other Dalits converted to Buddhism at Mota Samadhiyala village, where they had been allegedly beaten by the gaurakshaks. Pradip Parmar, a Dalit MLA from the BJP who attended the function, told The Indian Express: “I am a BJP worker, but had Babasaheb not given the Constitution and the provision of reservation, I would not have become an MLA.”
Is it common for Dalits to convert to Buddhism?
There have been numerous instances in recent years where Dalits, individually, families and in large groups, have embraced Buddhism. For instance, 30 Dalit youth converted to Buddhism at Sankalp Bhoomi in Vadodara, a place connected with B R Ambedkar, last October. Every year, people visit Deekshabhoomi in Nagpur where Ambedkar embraced Buddhism along with over 3 lakh followers on October 14, 1956, and take vows to follow the Buddha’s faith. Ambedkar’s “cremation ceremony in Bombay”, according to social historian Eleanor Zelliot, “was the occasion of another conversion, administered to a lakh of people by bhikku Anand Kausalyayan”. Zelliot writes that “on December 16, crowds gathered for prayer at the Diksha ground in Nagpur, and for conversion rites in Nasik and Bombay. Conversion ceremonies were held across the face of Maharashtra in the next two months”. The 1961 Census recorded 32.50 lakh Buddhists, with 27.89 lakh in Maharashtra; in 2011, these numbers were 84.43 lakh and over 65 lakh.
But why would Dalits want to convert to Buddhism?
Buddhism was the faith Ambedkar chose when he decided to leave Hinduism. On October 13, 1935, Babasaheb told a gathering of 10,000 people in Yeola that “I will not die a Hindu”. In the preceding years, he had hoped that Hinduism could be rid of untouchability and the caste system itself, and had supported reformist initiatives including temple entry movements. Zelliot recounts that in 1929 at Jalgaon, he stated that Untouchables should embrace other religions if their disabilities were not lifted, and within a month, 12 Mahars in the area had embraced Islam. Ambedkar’s own decision to convert “seems to have been made on intellectual and emotional grounds, a stab at the religion, which denied him equality and self-respect”, says Zelliot. “But it (also)… served as a threat, both to the reputation of Hinduism for tolerance and to Hindus as a political entity”.
Through the 1930s, Ambedkar stressed that conversion alone was the way for Dalit emancipation. Speaking at the All-Bombay District Mahar Conference in Dadar (May 30-31, 1936), he explained why he saw conversion as a political and spiritual act for Dalits. He identified sympathy, equality and liberty as the three factors required for the uplift of an individual in a religion, and said these were non-existent in Hinduism. “Conversion”, he said, “is necessary to the Untouchables as self-government is necessary to India. The ultimate object of both conversion and self-government is the same… This ultimate aim is to attain freedom.” Though he would convert to Buddhism only two decades later, Ambedkar concluded his speech by recalling a conversation between the Buddha and his disciple Ananda. He said, “I also take refuge in the words of the Buddha. Be your own guide. Take refuge in your own reason. Do not listen to the advice of others. Do not succumb to others. Be truthful. Take refuge in truth. Never surrender to anything.” To Ambedkar, self-respect and individual freedom were key categories, and Buddhism, he felt, was closest to his idea of a true religion.
Did this practice start with Ambedkar?
The modern use of conversion as a political tool started with Ambedkar, but the revolt against caste and the Brahminical order goes back to the Buddha himself. Islam, Christianity and Sikhism found converts among the oppressed Hindu castes. The Bhakti Movement posed a major challenge to Brahminism, and upheld anti-caste ideals and foregrounded the languages of ordinary people above Sanskrit. Basava, who established the Lingayat order as an egalitarian community in the 12th century for example, preferred Kannada as the language of communication.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, radical intellectuals, especially those from oppressed castes, started to challenge prevailing histories that privileged the rights of caste elites. For instance, Iyothee Thasar in the Tamil region imagined a Dravidian identity with roots in a Buddhist past for the Untouchable Pariah caste. Reformist leaders in Malayalam-speaking areas like Mitavadi Krishnan and Sahodaran Ayyappan proposed conversion out of Hinduism and as a political tool to negotiate the rights of the lower castes with the ruling elite. Several caste/ethnic/linguistic communities in the subcontinent produced similar leaders who rejected the social, political and religious leadership of Hindus who wished to replicate the caste hierarchy supported by Brahminical Hinduism. The threat of conversion played a seminal role in temple entry, right of way, anti-untouchability legislation and finally, the promotion of inter-dining and inter-caste marriages.
Is the conversion only to Buddhism?
No. In states like Tamil Nadu, Dalits see Islam and Christianity as options. In 1981, 150 Dalit families in Meenakshipuram, a village in southern Tamil Nadu, embraced Islam citing oppression by caste Hindus.
What is the political message in the Una conversions?
It undermines the BJP’s political project of building a Hindu vote encompassing all communities. The recent spate of atrocities against Dalits has exposed the contradictions in the Hindutva agenda, which valourises the past in uncritical terms and celebrates Brahminical values. The new Dalit, schooled in Ambedkarite thought, is unwilling to accept old hierarchies and value systems. The Sangh Parivar’s attempt to patronise and assume guardianship of Hinduism also has pitted Dalits against the religion. The Dalit revolt against Hindutva is increasingly being manifested as Dalits leaving Hinduism.
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