Technicalities of Doubting: Temple Consultations and Criminal Trials in India

Daniela Berti (1)

1 CEH - Centre d'Études Himalayennes

I deal in this chapter with practices of doubting in two institutional settings found in the Himachal Pradesh region of the Indian Himalayas, whichare both concerned with the process of judging.2My aim is not to investigate personal or cognitive experiences of doubting. By taking doubt as a matter of practice and technique, my aim is to see how doubting is managed and resolved in reference to decision‐making processes. First of all I talk about temple /p. 20/ consultations during which village deities, through their institutional mediums, are asked to arbitrate local conflicts and to give their verdict on people’s misconduct. These ritual procedures are then compared to the ways in which the techniques of doubting and proving are used in Indian criminal trials as well as in judges’rulings

Mots clés: Doubt, Religion and law

Mots clés: Doute, Religion et droit

Domaines: Anthropologie sociale et ethnologie; Droit

Daniela Berti. Technicalities of Doubting: Temple Consultations and Criminal Trials in India. Berti, Daniela and Good, Anthony and Tarabout, Gilles. Of Doubt and Proof. Ritual and Legal Practices of Judgment, Ashgate, 2015, Juris diversitas, 978‐1‐138‐63705‐4. ⟨hal-02321024⟩