Hindus in the Netherlands

Hinduism in the Netherlands has a special position in comparison with the position of this religious tradition in other Western countries, particularly Western Europe. Hinduism in the United States and in Canada is dominated by Hindus mostly coming directly from India, although there are also many autochthonous people feeling themselves at home in this tradition. In the United Kingdom the Hindus coming from India predominate, although there are also many others coming from other former British colonies. In partic-ular Ugandans have attracted much attention. Furthermore the UK counts many autochthonous Hindus. The Hindus living in Germany, Switzerland and Norway are mainly Tamils coming from Sri Lanka, where they fled from the civil war in the 1980s and 1990s. The Netherlands is the only Western country where the Hindustani Hindus originated from Suriname in the Car-ibbean predominate. This gives Dutch Hinduism a special flavor despite the presence of other much smaller groups, such as those of the Tamil Hindus, also from Sri Lanka, and of the autochthonous Hindus. The predominance of the Hindustani Hindus with their Caribbean background makes the situ-ation in Holland of special interest. Nonetheless this study will also pay at-tention to the other two groups and to the interaction between these three strands of Hinduism.
The next chapter will provide an introduction to the relationship between the Netherlands and Hinduism and give a well-reflected estimate of the number of people adhering this religious tradition today. Next it will discuss some approaches of religion, Hinduism, diaspora religions and some other important themes. Then it will explain the logic behind the structure of the book and conclude with a short survey of the contents of the chapters of this book. The focus of this study will be on temples. This means that the delineation this study presents concerning the development of the Hindu religion in the Netherlands, will be on lived religion. Temples are used for the performance of rituals, for worship, but in many cases also for other activities, such as marriage ceremonies, education, community de-velopment and the distribution of food. In other words, these temples are full of people who wish to implement the wisdom of their religious tradition and experience what the profound insights of this tradition offer them.