%0 Journal Article
%T Agents of the Godlings: An Ethnographic Account of Folk Hinduism in Himachal Pradesh
%A G. Kanato Chophy
%J Journal of the Anthropological Survey of India
%@ 2632-4369
%D 2019
%R 10.1177/2277436X19845444
%X Abstract This article gives an ethnographic account of a folk Hindu belief surrounding a popular village deity in Junga, a tehsil in Shimla district in rural Himachal Pradesh. A complex sociocultural relationship involving a village deity, a symbolic princely state, religious specialists and devotees is analysed. The article argues that a supernatural being or a deity that appeals to the masses is marked by its accessibility and tangibility, which instils deep faith in devotees and makes supernatural a part of mundane life, and not only confined to the realm of the sacred, and this characteristic feature found in a village deity cult lends ebullience to folk Hinduism
%K Caste system
%K folk Hinduism
%K Himachal Pradesh
%K mediums
%K village deity cult
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2277436X19845444