Bittoo Kapoor, an accountant, would not dream of beginning her day without lighting an incense stick and offering prayers to her favorite Hindu deity.
She considers herself a devout Hindu. But come December, Kapoor begins planning for Christmas — presents for relatives and friends, cakes and cookies to be baked, parties to be hosted.
"Christmas is Bada Din," or "big day" in the Hindi language, Kapoor said as she shopped for tree decorations at New Delhi's upscale Ansal Plaza mall.
"It doesn't matter if I'm a Hindu. Christmas stands for love, affection, sharing, renewing family bonds. It's a festival for everyone," Kapoor said.
In predominantly Hindu but officially secular India, a rise in militant Hindu nationalism has been matched surprisingly by a growing enthusiasm for celebrating Christmas with all the trimmings.
Satellite television has spread Western movies and programs, so in December, people throughout India are used to hearing Christmas stories.
Shops are filled with Christmas decorations, shiny silver bells, stars and twinkling lights, while resinous pines rub shoulders with plastic Christmas trees. Reindeers and bright cutouts of Santa Claus flutter in New Delhi's mild winter breeze.
"Every year the demand for trees goes up. Earlier, I'd get real pine trees from the Himalayan foothills. Now we get these real-looking trees from China," said Suresh Gupta, pointing to the neat row of collapsible plastic trees outside his shop.
The shop spills over with boxes of tree ornaments and decorations, red felt stockings, candy canes and other stocking stuffers. Gupta's specialties are tree ornaments in the shapes of stars and elephants, sewn in shimmering satin and embellished with sequins, gold cord and seed pearls by traditional Indian craft workers.
"Christmas, for me, is a festival like any Hindu festival. I do want my son to get to know other traditions," said Kitty Tawakley, a New Delhi resident, balancing armloads of Christmas gifts at the end of a daylong shopping spree.
But while elated shop owners and weary shoppers appeared to be swept away by the Christmas spirit, there are growing apprehensions that this festival is being taken over by mindless consumerism.
"The world over, the profound message of social justice symbolized by the birth of Jesus Christ is being overtaken by consumerism. And that is what you're getting to see here as well," Swami Agnivesh, a Hindu theologian and social activist, said Friday.
Hindus putting up trees in their homes and sharing gifts at Christmas do not reflect greater openness or tolerance, but are signs of the growing affluence of the Indian middle class, Agnivesh said.
"These very people will be out on the street tomorrow, forcing the slogan of Hindutva (Hindu-ness) on us," he said, referring to an upsurge in militant Hinduism. Hindu nationalists have attacked minority Christians and Muslims in different parts of the country over the past three years.
Nearly 1,000 people were killed, most of them Muslims, in religious riots in the western Indian state of Gujarat earlier this year. Elsewhere, too, the World Hindu Council and Bajrang Dal, religious affiliates of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, have trashed churches, beaten and killed missionaries, objecting to Christians converting members of the lower castes or poor tribespeople.
Christians account for only 2.4 percent of India's 1.2 billion population, but their influence far exceeds their size, primarily because of their prominent role in education and health care. Most Hindu middle- or upper-class people have attended a Christian school.
Christians form the majority only in Nagaland and Mizoram, two small states in India's remote northeast. Christians form a third of the population in the southern states of Kerala and Goa.
Most Hindus dismiss apprehensions of the ascendancy of Hindu nationalism by pointing to India's centuries-old diversity of religions and sects, and Hinduism's deep-rooted tradition of tolerance.
"Celebrating Christmas doesn't reduce my faith in Hinduism. If anything, it makes us more generous, more loving to each other. That's what I want my children to learn," Kapoor said.