Arya Samaj is a monotheistic Indian Hindu reform movement that promotes values and practices based on the belief in the infallible authority of the Vedas. The samaj was founded by the sannyasi (ascetic) Dayanand Saraswati on 7 April 1875.
Contemporary groups, collectively termed Hindu reform movements, reform Hinduism, Neo-Hinduism, or Hindu revivalism, strive to introduce regeneration and reform to Hinduism, both in a religious or spiritual and in a societal sense. The movements started appearing during the Bengali Renaissance.
Rev. Pandurang Shastri Athavale, also known as Dada /Dadaji, which literally translates as "elder brother" in Marathi, was an Indian activist, philosopher, spiritual leader, social revolutionary, and religion reformist, who founded the Swadhyaya Parivar in 1954. Swadhyaya is a self-study process based on the Bhagavad Gita which has spread across nearly 100,000 villages in India, Americas, Europe, Middle East, Oceania and other Asian countries with five million adherents. Noted for his discourses on the Bhagavad Gita, the Vedas and the Upanishads, Dadaji is also known for his selfless work and brilliant knowledge in scriptures.
Sant Dnyaneshwar, also referred to as Jnaneshwar, Jnanadeva, Dnyandev or Mauli or Dnyaneshwar Vitthal Kulkarni (1275–1296), was a 13th-century Indian Marathi saint, poet, philosopher and yogi of the Nath Shaiva and Varkari tradition. In his short life of 21 years, he authored Dnyaneshwari and Amrutanubhav. These are the oldest surviving literary works in the Marathi language, and considered to be milestones in Marathi literature. Sant Dnyaneshwar's ideas reflect the non-dualistic Advaita Vedanta philosophy and an emphasis on Yoga and bhakti towards Vithoba, an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. His legacy inspired saint-poets such as Eknath and Tukaram, and he is one of the founders of the Varkari (Vithoba-Krishna) Bhakti movement tradition of Hinduism in Maharashtra. Dnyaneshwar undertook samadhi at Alandi in 1296 by entombing himself in an underground chamber.
Kirtana, also rendered as Kirtan, is a Sanskrit word that means "narrating, reciting, telling, describing" of an idea or story, specifically in Indian religions. It also refers to a genre of religious performance arts, connoting a musical form of narration or shared recitation, particularly of spiritual or religious ideas, native to the Indian subcontinent.
Sant Tukaram Maharaj was a 17th-century Marathi poet, Hindu sant (saint), popularly known as Tuka, Tukobaraya, Tukoba in Maharashtra. He was a Sant of Varkari sampradaya - that venerates the god Vitthal - in Maharashtra, India. He was part of the egalitarian, personalized Varkari devotionalism tradition. Tukaram is best known for his devotional poetry called Abhanga and community-oriented worship with spiritual songs known as kirtan.
Marathi literature is the body of literature of Marathi, an Indo-Aryan language spoken mainly in the Indian state of Maharashtra and written in the Devanagari and Modi script.
Mahadev Govind Ranade, popularly referred to as Justice Ranade, was an Indian scholar, social reformer, judge and author. He was one of the founding members of the Indian National Congress party and owned several designations as member of the Bombay legislative council, member of the finance committee at the centre, and judge of the Bombay High Court, Maharashtra.
The Chitpavan Brahmin or Konkanastha Brahmin is a Hindu Maharashtrian Brahmin community inhabiting Konkan, the coastal region of the state of Maharashtra. Initially working as messengers and spies in the late seventeenth century, the community came into prominence during the 18th century when the heirs of Peshwa from the Bhat family of Balaji Vishwanath became the de facto rulers of the Maratha empire. Until the 18th century, the Chitpavans were held in low esteem by the Deshastha, the older established Brahmin community of Maharashtra region.
Pandurang Vaman Kane was a notable Indologist and Sanskrit scholar. He received India's highest civilian award Bharat Ratna in 1963 for his scholarly work that spanned more than 40 years of active academic research that resulted in 6,500 pages of History of Dharmaśāstra. The historian Ram Sharan Sharma says: "Pandurang Vaman Kane, a great Sanskritist wedded to social reform, continued the earlier tradition of scholarship. His monumental work entitled the "History of the Dharmasastra", published in five volumes in the twentieth century, is an encyclopedia of ancient social laws and customs. This enables us to study the social processes in ancient India."
Narayan Vaman Tilak was a Marathi poet from the Konkan region of then Bombay Presidency in British India, and a famous convert to Christianity from Chitpavan Brahmin Community.
Vithoba, also known as Vi(t)thal(a) and Panduranga, is a Hindu deity predominantly worshipped in the Indian state of Maharashtra and Karnataka. He is generally considered as a manifestation of the god Vishnu, or his avatar Krishna. Vithoba is often depicted as a dark young boy, standing arms akimbo on a brick, sometimes accompanied by his consort Rakhumai.
Sir Ramakrishna Gopal Bhandarkar was an Indian scholar, orientalist, and social reformer.
Sir Narayan Ganesh Chandavarkar was an early Indian National Congress politician and Hindu reformer. He was regarded by some as the "leading Hindu reformer of western India".
Vitthal Ramji Shinde was one of the most important social and religious reformers in Maharashtra, India. He was prominent among the liberal thinkers and reformists in India, prior to his independence. His greatest contribution was to attempt to remove the practice of untouchability and bring about equality to the depressed classes in Indian society.
Rao Bahadur Vishnu Moreshwar Mahajani was a Marathi poet and playwright from Maharashtra, India.
Ramabai Ranade was an Indian social worker and one of the first women's rights activists in the early 20th century. At the age of 11, she was married to Justice Mahadev Govind Ranade, who was a distinguished Indian scholar and social reformer. In that era of social inequality, women were not allowed to go to school and become literate.
Bal Ganghadhar Shastri Jambhekar is also known as Father of Marathi journalism for his efforts in starting journalism in Marathi language with the first newspaper in the language named 'Darpan' in the early days of British Rule in India.
Atmaram Pandurang or Atmaram Pandurang Turkhadekar was an Indian physician and social reformer who founded the Prarthana Samaj and was one of the two Indian co-founders of the Bombay Natural History Society. A graduate of Grant Medical College, he was a brother of Dadoba Pandurang, a scholar of Sanskrit and Marathi. Atmaram Pandurang served briefly as sheriff of Bombay in 1879.
