Article: Aṇuvrat Movement

Ācārya Tulsi
Image by Pramodjain3 © CC BY-SA 3.0

The Aṇuvrat Movement was conceived in the mid-20th century, during the important period after World War II, when India gained independence.

Ācārya Tulsi was inspired to create the Aṇuvrat Movement for two principal reasons. Firstly, he wanted to divert humankind from the path of destruction that had led to the nuclear bombings of Japan. He wished to introduce the non-violent Aṇuvrat Movement as an antidote to mass violence. Secondly, he was disillusioned by the selfishness, over-competiveness, over-consumerism and maximisation of profits by wrong means he saw in the newly independent republic of India.

Ācārya Tulsi held that the problems of violence, human rights, poverty and the environment cannot be solved all at once. Instead, he thought that he could use the concept of ‘lesser vows’ for the individual, borrowed from the Jain tradition, to develop a framework for social improvement that is achieved through personal action.

Interview with a Muslim Aṇuvratī
Image by Sanjeev Bothra © Sanjeev Bothra

From the beginning, Ācārya Tulsi, along with his core group of monks, designed the Aṇuvrat Movement to be a non-religious organisation open to anyone. The main goal is to purify the soul of the individual, which will eventually produce a more morally upright society.

Ācārya Tulsi took painstaking efforts to be inclusive in his modernisation of Jain principles. He realised that religious teaching alone is not enough and that action is also required. He believed that the idea of vows as action, which has its roots in Jain traditions, could be an effective tool for social change in secular society as well.

The following three factors were central motives for his new model:

• religious diversity within India
• secularism in India
• the philosophy of ‘lesser vows’.

A person from any caste, religion, creed, background or nation could be an Aṇuvratī – a follower of the Aṇuvrat code of conduct. An individual’s personal religious belief or eating habits are not considered an obstacle to following the Aṇuvrat code of conduct.

Thanks to its non-sectarian outlook, the Aṇuvrat Movement is one of the most powerful secular Terāpanth activities. It connects political leaders, thinkers, the media, religious organisations and ordinary people in India.

The prime objective of traditional Aṇuvrat vows, as explained in the 11th-century Śrāvakācāra – Householder’s Conduct – by Ācārya Amitagati, is liberation of the soul – mokṣa. The objective of the Aṇuvrat Movement is purification of the soul. In this way, Tulsian vows were a new approach to generating the spirit of self-restraint among all people.

The Aṇuvrat Movement is a social extension of an ancient spiritual tradition going back to Mahāvīra, the 24th Jina. Through the movement, Ācārya Tulsi was instrumental in taking Jain principles outside the Jain community.