Many great people were born in India. They guided people through their teachings and also made social reforms that removed ignorance and evil practices. We will learn about Shankaracharya, Ramanujacharya, Basaveshwara and Madhvacharya, the Bhakti saints such as Sri Chaitanya, Guru Nanak and Meerabai, and the Sufi saints.

• Born in Kaladi, Kerala, to Shivaguru and Aryamba. A genius, he understood the four Vedas at the age of eight.
• His philosophy is called Advaita.
• Reforms: he led people on the path of knowledge; through Advaita he taught that all people are one and equal; he stopped conflicts between castes; he set up four peethas (mathas) at Badrinath (Uttarakhand), Dwarka (Gujarat), Puri (Odisha) and Sringeri (Karnataka), which became centres uniting Indians.
• His work Bhaja Govindam is popular even today. He did all this in a life of only 32 years.

• Born at Sriperambudur near Chennai, to Keshava Dikshita and Kantimati; studied at Kanchi. His philosophy is Vishishtadvaita.
• He travelled in all four directions spreading Srivaishnavism and taught that salvation comes through devotion and surrender to God. The Hoysala king Vishnuvardhana welcomed him.
• Reforms: he encouraged caste harmony; condemned casteism and taught Bhakti to all castes; taught surrender to God without desires; and built grand temples at Melukote and in South India.

• From Basavana Bagewadi (Vijayapura district), son of Madarasa and Madalambika. Instead of upanayana he received linga diksha and studied at Kudalasangama. His philosophy is Shaktivishishtadvaita.
• Bijjala, the Kalachuri king of Kalyana, made him treasurer. He preached progressive ideas in Kalyana; traditionalists opposed him, so he went to Kudalasangama, where he is believed to have become one with God.
• Reforms: he wanted a casteless and classless society; taught ‘Kayakave Kailasa’ (Work is Worship); condemned casteism, idol worship and sacrifices, saying ‘one’s body itself is a temple’; his words ‘woman is a mother, she is everything’ gave confidence to women; he set up the Anubhava Mantapa at Basavakalyana for the Vachanakaras; he wrote thousands of vachanas ending with ‘Kudala Sangamadeva’.
• On 13-02-2024 the Government of Karnataka declared Vishwaguru Basavanna the cultural leader of Karnataka.
• Kayaka is work done with devotion; sharing its fruits equally with all is Dasoha.
• Vachana literature: a special form that can be read like prose or sung like a poem. Vachanakaras like Jedara Dasimayya, Allamaprabhu, Chenna Basavanna and Akka Mahadevi came from all castes and classes. Their thoughts are relevant even today.

• Born at Pajaka (Belle) near Udupi, to Madhyageha Bhatta and Vedavati. After taking sanyasa he travelled across India twice. Lord Vishnu was his deity. His philosophy is Dvaita.
• Reforms: wrote many Sanskrit works; appointed eight pontiffs to worship Lord Krishna at Udupi; preached the simple path of Bhakti.
• Each pontiff worshipped for two months in turn; later saint Vadiraja made this paryaya two years. The Uttaradi, Vyasaraya and Raghavendra mathas also follow Madhva’s teachings. People of Karnataka, Andhra, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra were influenced.

India is a land of saints. They brought social harmony, showed the right path and exposed social evils. They taught that Bhakti (devotion) is the only way to God’s grace: this is the Bhakti cult.

Features:

• It condemned high–low discrimination and preached equality.
• Saints opposed and mocked outdated customs.
• Sufi saints said religion means love of all and service to mankind, and that there is only one God.
• Saints worked to unite people’s hearts.

• Sri Chaitanya (Navadweep, West Bengal): condemned caste discrimination; taught Bhakti as the only path to mukti; spread love, brotherhood and charity through pilgrimages.
• Guru Nanak (Talwandi, now in Pakistan): founder of Sikhism; showed what Hinduism and Islam share; his songs, Japji, are in the Guru Granth Sahib. Sikhism stresses chanting God’s name, good deeds and equality of men and women: “How can a woman, who gives birth to kings and prophets, be inferior to men?” He also said, “Even if I have a lakh tongues, I will chant the name of one God on all of them.” He visited Karnataka; the place in Bidar where he stayed is Nanak Jhira.
• Meerabai: the ‘Radha of Kaliyug’, from a Rajput royal family of Rajasthan (daughter of Ratan Singh of the Rathod family of Jodhpur). She worshipped Giridhar Gopal (Krishna), left the palace when her mother-in-law objected and went to Brindavan. Her bhajans live in millions of hearts.
• Kabirdas: condemned caste, idol worship, pilgrimages, fasts and rituals; called himself the ‘child of Allah and Rama’.
• Tulsidas: wrote ‘Ramcharitamanasa’. Surdas: born blind; wrote ‘Sur Sagar’.

• Sufism came to India from Arabia. Sufis wore coarse woollen clothes (suf) as a sign of poverty. They were influenced by Yoga, Vedanta and Buddhism; some, like Baba Budan, worshipped Dattatreya. Budan-al-din of Vijayapura wrote songs praising Krishna.
• They taught that religion is love and service, and expressed Bhakti by singing and dancing. There were women Sufis too, like Rabiha.
• Nizamuddin Auliya: India’s major Sufi saint in Delhi; lived in poverty in a thatched mosque, refused a village from the Sultan, kept away from politics and taught good conduct and compassion.
• Bandenawaz: famous Sufi of Karnataka; his darga is in Kalaburagi; Hindus worshipped him as Keshav Chaitanya.
• Chisti sect: founded by Moyinuddin Chisti at Ajmer; followers value piety, service to the guru and right living; they worked for Hindu–Muslim harmony and wrote in regional languages. Salim Chisti of Fatehpur (Agra) was a well-known Chisti.