ABSTRACT
For a few days in November 2009, the small town of Unjha in North Gujarat could pride itself on being a Hindu sacred centre boasting at least half a million devotees, allegedly all from one caste. The station where farmers normally take their cumin and cotton crops was humming with people arriving in special trains from Ahmadabad to attend the ‘Silver Jubilee’ of the temple of their caste goddess, the kuldevi Umiya Mataji of the Kadva Patidar. For weeks, lists of large donations from well-known industrialist houses and wealthy farmers were publicly circulated. The temple buildings had been refurbished, and the compound enlarged and equipped with 24 air-conditioned rooms for the temple guesthouse. Large tents were put up around the temple to shelter the masses of Patidars coming from elsewhere in Gujarat and India, as well as from faraway places such as the US, the UK, Tanzania and Uganda, to feast the goddess. Even the guesthouses attached to a Muslim pilgrimage centre in the neighbouring village were asked to keep most of their rooms available for Umiya Mataji’s devotees. Gujarat’s chief minister, Narendra Modi, gave a moving speech about his devotion to the kuldevi of his njati (caste) when opening the havan (vegetarian sacrifice) performed by twenty-one Brahmans. During the days of the festival, the temple trust had thought of a spectacular way to show devotion to Umiya Mataji by offering helicopter flights to those who wished to have darshan (divine sight) from above and were willing to pay 25,000 R.s for it. The local press covered the event extensively, praising the economic achievements and unrelenting devotion of Patidars as utterly beneficial for Gujarat in particular and India in general.
