Legal status of Jainism as a distinct religion in India

Jainism is considered to be a legally distinct religion in India. A section of scholars earlier considered it as a Hindu sect or a Buddhist heresy, but it is one of the three ancient Indian religions. On 30 January 2014, the Government of India explicitly awarded the status of a "minority religion" to the Jain community in India, as per Section 2(c) of the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) Act (NCM), 1992.

In 1993, the National Minorities Commission arrived at their recommendation that the Jain community be declared as a minority religious community. It was in consideration of the following:

It resolved to recommend to the Government of India that the Jains deserve to be recognised as a distinct religious minority, and that, therefore the Government of India may consider including them in the listing of "Minorities."

In 2005, the Supreme Court of India declined to issue a writ of Mandamus towards granting Jains the status of a religious minority throughout India. The Court however left it to the respective states to decide on the minority status of Jain religion.

In one of the observations of the Supreme Court, not forming part of the judgment, the Court said:

The Supreme Court also noted: " … that the State Governments of Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand have already notified Jains as 'minority' in accordance with the provisions of the respective State Minority Commissions Act."

This cast a doubt on the independent standing of Jain religion. Scholars in the Jain tradition, as well as several groups amongst the Jain community protested, and emphasised that Jain religion stands as a religion in its own right. While Hinduism as a mode of living, and as a culture is to be found across various religions in India because of several common customs, traditions and practices, but as religions Hindu religion and Jain religion are distinct.

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