“Here, the high lasts longer, and I don’t even get a hangover,” said a Gen Z Indian who attended a devotional concert one night recently—a comment that sums up a sea change of sorts that’s afflicting the new generation.
And this New Year’s Eve, an increasing number of young Indians may just be hitting a spiritual occasion rather than a conventional alcohol or drug-fuelled all-nighter.
Perhaps the trend was in the offing, coming as it does on the tailwinds of the spiritual boom and awakening that youngsters have been taking to in recent years.
Pilgrimages and spiritual getaways are a big part of this, and so, it is perhaps well in the order of things that New Year’s Eve—that last bastion of guilt-free hedonism—is also getting a makeover.
“Gen Z is driving a massive surge in spiritual tourism this year-end, with accommodation bookings across 56 pilgrimage destinations in India growing 19 per cent last year,” said Gireesh Vasudev Kulkarni, founder of Temple Connect, which is building up a devotional events framework that includes crowd management, safety, and a spiritual tourism supply chain.
Reports indicate that queries for spiritual destinations have been on the rise on travel platforms, with travel to Haridwar and Rishikesh seeing a higher rate of growth than, say, Goa.
“The trend marks spirituality's personal reclamation, with India's 58.5 billion dollar spiritual market growing 10 per cent yearly through 2034, as the youth trade parties for shlokas,” quipped Kulkarni.
Of course, trust Gen Z to give it their own twist.
On the agenda are anything from ‘bhajan clubbin’’ to kirtan concerts, as well as a New Year’s Eve escape to places like temple towns.
For older generations brought up on entering into a new year dancing and drinking, this trend may appear weird, especially coming from a difficult-to-understand new generation.
Yet, it fits in with the whole spiritual awakening Gen Z has found solace in—in an era marked by uncertainty, strife, workplace stress, endless scrolling, and alienation—most remarkably manifesting in the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns that extended for months on end.
The new trend also stems from a rejection of the older generation’s panacea of alcohol and nightclubs as the de facto mode of entertainment to something they consider spiritually fulfilling, but at the same time ‘fun’.
It is, then, no wonder that Radhika Das’s Kirtan concert at Yashobhoomi in Delhi last month attracted an estimated 18,000 young revellers. The spiritual boom is distinctly different from what we generally perceive devotion and spiritualism to be—staid rooms where people sit in reverence wearing white or such similar ‘spartan’ outfits, and look for salvation.
Instead, bhajan clubbing events are high-energy gatherings, with devotional music thumping to EDM beats, crowds sinking into the group energy fervour, and chai bars in service. The concerts sell their tickets on apps like Zomato’s District—the events going viral thanks to astute religious influencers (yes, that’s a thing) promoting them, and Gen Z attending them with their gang.
In fact, beyond Indian Gen Z going full-throttle divine as an antidote to their endlessly consumerist pace of life, globally, too, there is a slow (but distinct) trend of moving away from the established norm of entertainment meaning going to clubs and bars and partaking in alcohol and dancing.
Western countries like Canada and the UK are already reporting a drastic drop in the number of clientele at watering holes and such entertainment spots, even while memberships at health and wellness clubs have been on the rise.
The dastardly terror attack apart, Australia’s Bondi Beach had already caught the attention of the Anglophile world with its massive beach crowds early morning at 6 AM—all into health-oriented activities ranging from swimming, working out, yoga, and alternate practices like Tai Chi.