Jainism is India's sixth-largest religion and is practiced throughout India. Per the 2011 census, there are 4,451,753 Jains in the 1.21 billion population of India, the majority living in Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, however, the influence of Jainism has been far greater on the Indian population than these numbers suggest. Jains can be found in 34 out of 35 states and union territories, with Lakshdweep being the only union territory without Jains. The state of Jharkhand, with a population of 16,301 Jains also contains the holy pilgrimage centre of Shikharji.
History
Jain doctrine teaches that Jainism has always existed and will always exist, Like most ancient Indian religions, Jainism has its roots from the Indus Valley Civilization, reflecting native spirituality prior to the Indo-Aryan migration into India. Other scholars suggested the Shramana traditions were separate and contemporaneous with Indo-Aryan religious practices of the historical Vedic religion. In August 2005, the Supreme Court of India ruled that Jainism, Sikhism are distinct religions, but are inter-connected and inter-related to Hinduism, so these three are part of wider broader Hindu religion, based on the historic background on how the Constitution had come into existence after. However, in the 2006 verdict, Supreme Court of India found that the "Jain Religion is indisputably not a part of the Hindu Religion".
On January 20, 2014, the Government of India awarded the minority status to the Jain community in India, as per Section 2 of the National Commission for Minorities Act, 1992. This made the Jain community which makes for 4.5 million or 0.36 percent of the population as per 2011 census, the sixth community to be designated this status as a "national minority", after Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis. Though Jains already had minority status in 11 states of India including Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, in 2005 a petition was filed with Supreme Court of India, by community representatives, which was also backed by the National Minorities Commission. In its judgement the court left the decision to the Central government.
Jainism by state
Jainism as a religion exists throughout India. Jainism also varies from state to state, but the core values are the same.
