New Thought on Impact Of Religion on INDIA!!
Updated: Jul 20
Religion is a word that we all are aware of but do we really understand the meaning of it? By far this question is asked a lot of times and each time we get a different answer or so to say a different perspective. According to me, we never understood the meaning of religion. We all believe in a particular ideology which is mostly framed by the society of our ancestors and then we mold it as per our convenience. There are many religions in India i.e. Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism, Judaism, etc. All these religions have their own beliefs and ideologies which are presented to them by their “Creators”.
Now, we all know that many of these religious groups have tried to overpower the other group in many ways and this is not something that belongs to the modern era but the roots of the same trace back to the medieval history and after that the colonial Era, from Ashoka’s reign where he killed many followers of Mahaveera for the sake of uplifting Buddhism to Mughal empire where they destroyed Hindu and Jain temples to build mosques (not every Mughal Emperor did that). In recent times also (after 1947) many riots have taken place in the name of religion.
It is not only one religious group that tried to be rebellious, each and every group mentioned above has tried to cause chaos in the history or recent past. The question is what does society get in return after these events other than the destruction of property of innocent individuals that include houses, shops, and buildings, loss of innocent lives, as a result of which a lot of children become orphans and women become widows. Going by the stats recent communal riots in Delhi Cost around $34.65 billion loss and Gujarat riot of 2002 cost around $760 Million.

Note: Although the above image shows the stats for the period 2010-2015, I managed to arrange the stats for the period 2008-2017. Every year, counting from 2005-2017, an average of 113 people died in communal riots and many people’s lives have been destroyed to the extent that they would have preferred dying over living like that. Religious ideologies have never ever mentioned overpowering any other human being or changing his/her beliefs but we pretend to obey the ideology of a particular religion and at the same time completely disrespect it. I have read Bhagavad Geeta and It has 18 chapters and a total of 700 slokas. Each of its shlok explains the way of living and how to focus on karma.
Nowhere in the book, Lord Krishna said about building temples or any place of worship, also he never said anything regarding inequality on the basis of caste (Although, he did mention the creation of 4 classes by him for serving a different purpose not what they serve now). We started discrimination all by ourselves on the basis of caste and gave the excuse that our religious ideology said to do so. In India, this problem is very severe. We are in the age of Artificial Intelligence but still, we do such religious misinterpretations.
The most disturbing thing is we also called it our culture which according to me is demeaning our Indian culture which is our pride. Now think, what is it really that religion has bestowed upon us as a whole? Yes, it does try to give the idea of being human which we definitely fail to understand. Talking about growth as a nation did we really get anything out of it on that part? Did our religious ideology and beliefs help us grow as a nation? Does it help toward a reduction in poverty and an increase in education? We all know the answers to these questions but still, fail to rectify it as a nation.
According to me, the only thing which should matter to us is being Indian. That is the only identity one should have because accept it or not but people around the world will know you by this identity only, not your religious one which we proudly display in front of our fellow Indians. In my point of view, religion has been the biggest hurdle in our growth as a nation in modern times because politicians take it as an agenda in elections, businessmen use it as a tool to decide with whom they want to develop business relations and ultimately people use it as a way of deciding who should be treated as human and who should not!

We Indians mostly believe in something when we are provided with some proof or by the example of the existence of that idea. So for that matter, China is the greatest example that if there are no religious groups present in the country then the growth rate is very high. In China, 91% of the people are Han Chinese and they don't believe in religion.
I am not saying that their model of progress and beliefs will give us the same result but I can assure you that we will be in a much better position than today and our growth rate will increase. To a certain extent the only thing these wrong religious practices do is creating the Mental gap and choking of new thoughts.
I am not against any practice of religious beliefs but they should be proper and perfectly placed in a manner they are supposed to be. In that way, we all will prosper and grow as a nation. We should remember being Indian before being a Hindu, Jain, Sikh, Muslim, Christian, etc. We have already tried being one of the above and we know, where it will exactly lead us to. So let’s give a shot on Being Indian and see what happens.
Please mention your views in the comment section and Let’s Discuss on this topic.