Monumentalizing Tantra : the multiple identities of the Haṃseśvarī Devī Temple and the Bansberia Zamīndāri

This thesis examines the complex interplay between colonial modernity and Sakta (goddess-centered) devotion in the context of an elite family of zamindars (landholders) in Bengal. One consequence of colonialism in Bengal was the efflorescence of overt Sakta religiosity among Bengal's elite. Religious practice, supposedly "protected" by the colonial order, became the site where indigenous elites expressed political will and, to an extent, resisted foreign domination. I argue that the zamindars of Bansberia in the Hugli district of Bengal were creative agents, engaging and resisting the various cultural ruptures represented by colonial rule in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Employing analyses of archival material, contemporary ethnography, and architectural style, this thesis is an ethnohistory of a modern zamindari-kingdom that locates its political voice in an emblematic Sakta-Tantric temple. It demonstrates the powerful relationship between religion and politics in colonial Bengal and discusses the implications of this strong association in the contemporary context