From Ritual Mourning to Solitary Grief: Reinterpretation of Hindu Death Rituals in India

This paper considers the way the outbreak of coronavirus and the subsequent lockdown has egregiously impeded the Hindu death ceremonies and mourning rituals in India. It makes a comparative analysis of how Hindu death rituals get renegotiated, modified and reinterpreted across two vastly different regions of India, both of which have their local customs. Whilst death rituals in India are contingent on the deceased's caste, community, class, gender and age, the impediment to the major death rituals creates a central conundrum for all mourners. It results from the substitution of 'sacred' ritual guidelines with new 'profane' ones for the 'disposal' of deceased COVID-19 patients. Departure from many significant pre-liminal rites, specific transition rites, and post-liminal rites has eschatological, ritual and cultural ramifications. The inability to grieve in unison during a Shraddh ceremony denies mourners any scope to quell distressing feelings about mortality which serves as a source of consolation.

Keywords: COVID-19; Hindu death rituals; good and bad death; rites de passage; stigma.

Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

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