Paper short abstract

This paper proposes a description and an analysis of the emergence of Lokanātha Brahmachāri’s wayside shrines and private temples in contemporary Kolkata.

Paper long abstract

Many East-Bengalis Hindus as well as Muslims started revering the yogi Lokanātha Brahmachāri - popularly known as Lokanātha Bābā - as a saintly figure after his death in 1890. In West Bengal, its cult started around the same time however, it is almost a century later, from the beginning of the late 1980's onwards, that his cult became an important part of public Hindu worship among different section of Bengali society. Drawing on an extensive study of Lokanātha Bābā's shrines in Kolkata, this paper will propose a classification of them. More specifically it will focus on the progressive re-localization of the saint's image: from way-side shrines to private temples and try to understand the social, economical and judicial dynamic at stake behind this move.