INDIA—Communication, just like the Hindi word “darshan,” is a two-way street. People are looking at the Gods and the Gods are looking back at them. And those who can’t get enough of just watching are capturing the Godly images on their cellphones.
In India, religious messages are everywhere, from the boulevards of large cities and to the alleyways of the small towns. Simultaneously, the worshipers bring technology into the temples to record their ritual moments and their experience at the holy space.
Part I. Religious messages are ubiquitous.
Religion is present in all aspects of Indian social and family life. God’s message can be seen at different places in a variety of forms: A t-shirt print in an ashram, posters everywhere, a billboard ad in a rural town, and prayer flags in an elementary school, just to name a few.
The intentions of these messages are not necessarily the same. People hang posters and flags of religion-related content, namely, deities, gurus or holy text for prayers and auspiciousness. Though it may seem unusual to weave religion into a commercial context or alongside modern medical studies, it shows the status ofreligion and in people’s quotidian life in India.
Despite the variety of the mediums and intentions, the images in such messages are usually vivid, cheerful and full of colors.
A billboard in Vrindavan invites visitors to enjoy “a royal stay” at a local hotel. Lord Krishna, seen playing a flute in the ad, spent his childhood in this village, according to epic Mahabharata.
Flyers of deities and a guru are posted on a muddy trashcan in the rural village of Vrindavan.
In the spiritual leader and yoga guru, Baba Ramdev’s garden-like Kripalu Bagh ashram, a monk wears a shirt with the guru posing on his back.
In a hospital at the Kripalu Bagh ashram, both medicinal studies and the practice of the yogi guru are both celebrated.
On a tourist bus, a driver puts up pictures of Lord Shiva and baby Krishna, as well as a deity he doesn’t know the name of, to look over his safety on the road.
A cartoon-like, colorfully decorated deity was printed on a calendar.
Part II. Technology is in the temple.
At the same time, followers are not only passively receiving the message, but actively chronicling their religious experiences using cell phones. They may not be able to make pilgrimages to famous temples. But by taking pictures and recording videos, they preserve a sample of the authenticity of rituals and spaces.
Visitors and followers recording the qawwali ceremony at Nizamuddin Dargah, a Sufi shrine in Delhi. (above 3 photos)
A woman recording inside a Buddhist temple in the Tibetan colony in New Delhi.
A group posing for a picture in the ISKCON temple in Vrindavan.
Inside the ISKCON temple, the crowd could hardly move. Many people use their cell phones to record the chanting of the monks and the temple’s interiors.
A camera and a speaker are placed in the ISKCON temple, next to a decoration that appears to be a peacock, considered a symbol of purity in Hinduism.
At an aarti ritual by the Ganges in Rishikesh, participants take pictures of the ritual at sunset. (Above 2 photos)