Everyday Religiosity among the Hindu Sindhis of India: Sindhi Identity and the Religious Market in the Era of Social Networks

Abstract This chapter focuses on a minority that migrated from Sindh, in present-day Pakistan, after the 1947 Partition: the Hindu Sindhis. About one million Hindu Sindhis settled in India, especially in the western part of the country. They had to face hardship when most of them were settled in refugee camps built for the British army. Year after year, they were able to contribute to the economic development of India, thanks to their skills in different areas, especially in civil service and trade. While the Hindu Sindhis’ religion is usually depicted as syncretic and heterodox, the chapter explores the impact resulting from the use of smartphones on the everyday Sindhi religiosity as well as their relationship with their Sindhi identity. Following Stig Hjarvard’s mediatization theory arguing that religion is increasingly being subsumed under the logic of the media, the chapter indicates that the omnipresence of the smartphone is giving rise to a new phase in the development of digital religiosities that began with the use of the Internet on more traditional media such as computers.