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Krishna's Curse in the Age of Global Tourism: Hindu pilgrimage priests and their trade*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2016

KNUT AUKLAND
KNUT AUKLAND*
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies, and Religion, University of Bergen, Norway Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

This article explores the strategies of pandas (Hindu pilgrimage priests) in Vrindavan, relating changes in their trade (pandagiri) to tourism. These changes are the result of the pandas’ creative adjustments to shifting travel patterns that affect their market niche. Utilizing audio-recordings of the pandas’ guided tours, the article first portrays how pandas acquire ritual income from pilgrims by ‘inspiring’ donations of which they get a percentage. While commercial interests and economic conditions have always been crucial in shaping and perpetuating pilgrimage institutions and practices, global tourism has become an increasingly significant factor. Pandas all over India modify their services while the traditional exchange model (jajmani system) wanes. Changing travel patterns have made the guided tour a crucial component in the operation of Hindu pilgrimage. Vrindavan pandas have therefore turned into guides conducting religious sightseeing tours (darshan yatra). These tours are core to the new strategy for acquiring ritual income. To secure clients, pandas build connections with travel agencies and drivers and, in some cases, establish their own travel agencies that combine priestly and tourism services. The pandas’ own understandings of their methods and contemporary travel trends further reflect the dynamic interplay between pilgrimage and tourism in India.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 50 , Issue 6 , November 2016 , pp. 1932 - 1965
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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Footnotes

*

Thanks to Håkon Tandberg, Kathinka Frøystad, Knut Melvær, Michael Stausberg, the South Asia symposium group in Oslo, and the anonymous Modern Asian Studies reviewers for feedback on earlier drafts of this article. Amitanshu Verma and Dhiren Borisa assisted in translating the audio-recordings. I am also grateful to Laxminarayan Tiwari at the Braj Culture Research Institute for sharing his local expertise. Finally, I would like to thank to Moumita Sen for collaborative fieldwork in Vrindavan in 2015.

References

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18 I was first introduced to this term by a local historian.

19 Darshan is a religious concept that typically refers to the auspicious beholding of deities and their manifestations on earth, while yatra typically means journey, though it can also refer to pilgrimage. The concept of a darshan yatra is therefore a reformatting of a typical guided tour or sightseeing tour of cultural tourism into a religious concept.

20 I return to the specific details of the Nanda Rai system below.

21 This is in part informed by Michael Stausberg's understanding of the relationship between religion and tourism. Stausberg, M., Religion and Tourism: Crossroads, Destinations and Encounters, Routledge, London/New York, 2011, p. 8 Google Scholar.

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23 I have changed various details in the interest of anonymity.

24 I am currently working on a manuscript dealing with Prem Mandir, Vaishno Devi Ashram, and other religious attractions in northern India.

25 The panda’s narrative during the tour was audio-recorded on 16 March 2015.

26 Note that in the case of god images, darshan also implies an exchange of gazes—the god also looks back at the beholder. See Eck, D. L., Darsan: Seeing the Divine Image in India, Columbia University Press, New York, pp. 7–8 Google Scholar.

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28 The ‘carrying on the shoulder’ refers to the deathbed that is carried to cremation.

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31 TripAdvisor allows travellers to share reviews of their travel and service experiences, while supporting itself through advertising on the site. www.tripadvisor.in/ShowTopic-g951350-i15414-k4607557-o20-Beware_of_guides_in_vrindavan-Vrindavan_Uttar_Pradesh.html, [accessed 20 February 2016].

32 ‘Final report on 20 years perspective for Uttar Pradesh’, Ministry of Tourism, Chapter 9, p. 15, November 2002. http://www.incredibleindia.org/images/docs/trade-pdf/surveys-and-studies/perspective-plans-of-states-UTs/up.pdf, [accessed 20 February 2016].

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34 ‘Lapka’ generally refers to unauthorized guides, photographers, and others who are seen to cheat and harass tourists.

35 For an on-going case in Nandagao see: http://news.vrindavantoday.org/2014/11/steps-taken-contain-miscreant-pandas-nandgaon/, [accessed 20 February 2016].

36 Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 104, notes a less favourable saying among people in Banares: ‘Brahmans and dogs are two castes that cannot live together [in peace].’

37 Gold, Fruitful Journeys, p. 275.

38 Gladstone, From Pilgrimage to Package Tour, p. 185.

39 cf. Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 108.

40 Shinde, ‘Entrepreneurship’, p. 529.

41 Hawley, At Play with Krishna, pp. 30–1.

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44 Jacobsen, Pilgrimage in the Hindu Tradition.

45 Ibid., p. 85.

46 Ibid., pp. 64, 79, 85.

47 Ibid., pp. 87–8.

48 Cf. Bhardwaj, S. M., Hindu Places of Pilgrimage in India: A Study in Cultural Geography, Munshiram Manoharilal Publishers, New Delhi, 2003 Google Scholar [1983], pp. 5, 209.

49 Jacobsen, Pilgrimage in the Hindu Tradition, p. 95.

50 Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 99.

51 Ibid., p. 97. Parry observed that while ‘panda’ was used as a generic term for various pilgrimage priests, ‘tirth purohit’ was the term used by local priests to describe those keeping registers and maintaining long-term relationships with clients.

52 Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 98.

53 Jajman (or yajman) means ‘patron of the sacrifice’ and refers to the pilgrim. In this context these terms are not related to the jajmani system of village distribution. See Fuller, C. J., ‘Misconceiving the grain heap: a critique of the concept of the Indian jajmani system’ in Money and Morality of Exchange, Parry, J. and Bloch, M. (eds), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989, pp. 33–63 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Parry, Death in Banaras, pp. 97ff.

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57 cf. Parry, Death in Banaras, pp. 97–8.

58 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, p. 260; cf. Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 98.

59 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, pp. 256–7.

60 Ibid., pp. 244–5.

61 Ibid., pp. 245–6; Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 99.

62 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, pp. 185–8, 250–9; Parry, Death in Banaras, pp. 97–109.

63 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, p. 258

64 Ibid., p. 188. See Parry, Death in Banaras, pp. 108–9 for a somewhat contrary view.

65 Reader, Pilgrimage in the Marketplace, p. 11; cf. Glushkova, I., ‘Moving God(s)ward, calculating money: Wonders and wealth as essentials of a tirtha-yatra’, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, vol. 29, 2006, pp. 128–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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69 Ibid., p. 11.

70 Cf. Bhardwaj, Hindu Places of Pilgrimage, p. 5. See Lochtefeld, ‘Pandas’, pp. 243–4 for a more idealistic perspective on pandagiri. See also van der Veer, Gods on Earth, pp. 259–61, for an argument against more idealistic interpretations of pandas and pandagiri, a position I broadly support in this article.

71 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, p. 260.

72 Lochtefeld, God's Gateway, pp. 125, 128.

73 Bhardwaj, Hindu Places of Pilgrimage, p. 209.

74 Ibid., p. 208, fn. 16; Lochtefeld, God's Gateway, pp. 243–4.

75 Chaudhuri, The Bakreshwar Temple, pp. 30, 70–72.

76 Lochtefeld, God's Gateway, p. 135, fn. 36.

77 Joseph, C. A. and Kavoori, A. P., ‘Mediated resistance: Tourism and the host community’, Annals of Tourism Research, vol. 28, 2007 Google Scholar; Joseph, C. A., ‘Hindu nationalism, community rhetoric and the impact of tourism: The “divine dilemma” of Pushkar’ in Raj Rhapsodies: Tourism, Heritage and the Seduction of History, Henderson, C. E. and Weisgrau, M. (eds), Ashgate, Aldershot, 2007 Google Scholar.

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79 Lochtefeld, God's Gateway, p. 141.

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84 Lochtefeld, God's Gateway, p. 142.

85 For colonial and post-colonial examples, see Mukhopadhyay, A., ‘Colonised gaze? Guidebooks and journeying in colonial India’, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, vol. 37, p. 667 Google Scholar; and Chaudhuri, The Bakreshwar Temple, pp. 49–51.

86 Shinde, ‘Entrepreneurship’, p. 530.

87 Ibid., p. 533; Shinde, K., ‘Visiting sacred sites in India: Religious tourism or pilgrimage?’ in Religious tourism and pilgrimage festivals management: An international perspective, Raj, R. and Morpeth, N. D., CABI, Wallingford/Oxfordshire/Cambridge, 2007, p. 191 Google Scholar.

88 http://www.tripadvisor.in/ShowTopic-g951350-i15414-k4607557o20Beware_of_guides_in_vrindavan-Vrindavan_Uttar_Pradesh.html

89 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, p. 198; Parry, Death in Banaras, pp. 103–4.

90 Singh, Domestic Tourism in Asia, p. 96.

91 Shinde, ‘Visiting sacred sites in India’, p. 194.

92 Cf. Stausberg, Religion and Tourism, p. 66.

93 Parry, Death in Banaras, pp. 102–3.

94 Ibid., p. 104.

95 Varanasi boatmen also operate in a similar way. See Doron, A., ‘Encountering the “other”: Pilgrims, tourists and boatmen in the city of Varanasi’, The Australian Journal of Anthropology, vol. 16, 2005, p. 169 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

96 Parry, Death in Banaras, p. 107.

97 Hawley, At Play with Krishna, pp. 32–3.

98 For more on such relations in Rishikesh, see Aukland, ‘Retailing religion’.

99 van der Veer, Gods on Earth, pp. 251–2.

100 Ibid., p. 243.

101 ‘Setting’ is one of those terms used in the informal sector (and otherwise) to indicate an agreement, arrangement or unwritten contract between two parties.

102 Shinde, ‘Religious tourism: Exploring a new form of sacred journey in North India’ in Asian Tourism: Growth and Change, J. Cochrane (ed.), Elsevier, Amsterdam/Boston/London, 2008, p. 255, notes that more than 50 tour operators have established agencies between 2001–2006.

103 www.tripadvisor.in/ShowTopic-g951350-i15414-k4607557-o20-Beware_of_guides_in_vrindavan-Vrindavan_Uttar_Pradesh.html

104 I got the idea that this not the case today, in particular from one senior panda sitting in a Nanda Rai waiting for incoming clients, who aggressively asserted that they do not give anything to widows.

105 Gold, Fruitful Journeys, p. 275.

106 The idea of going on or ‘making a picnic’ (piknik banate hai) in this context refers to a wide range of outdoor leisure activities beyond the specific act of having a packed meal or bringing food on an outing.

107 Whitmore, ‘In Pursuit of Maheshvara’, pp. 67–8.

108 Tirthyatra is the standard Hindi term for pilgrimage, whereas the traditional pilgrimage route that all the sites related to Krishna in the Braj region, including Vrindavan, is known as the Braj yatra. See Shinde, ‘Religious tourism’, for a description of a car Braj yatra.