Shiva, often termed as 'The Destroyer' in the Hindu pantheon, is the deity the largest number of Hindus identify with, according to a survey counducted by the Pew Research Centre.
The survey was conducted using face-to-face interviews among 22,975 Hindus. As part of the survey, respondents were asked which deity they feel closest to – showing them 15 images of deities on a card as possible options. The vast majority of Hindus - 84 percent selected more than one god or indicated that they have many personal gods.
The deity that Hindus most commonly feel close to is Shiva (44 percent). In addition, about one-third of Hindus feel close to Hanuman or Ganesha (35 percent and 32 percent respectively).
Since, people were given the option to pick multiple deities, the total is more than 100 percent.
Only 17 percent Hindus said they feel close to Lord Ram, whose name comes across more commonly in the media or in political contexts. A higher proportion picked Lakshmi (28 percent), Krishna (21 percent) and Kali (20 percent).
There is a lot of regional variation in how close India’s Hindus feel to some deities. For example, 46 percent
of Hindus in India’s West feel close to Ganesha, but only 15 percent feel this way in the Northeast. And 46 percent of Hindus in the Northeast feel close to Krishna, while just 14 percent in the South say the same.
Feelings of closeness for Lord Ram are especially strong in the Central region (27 percent) but much lesser in other parts. The survey identifies Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Uttarakhand as central region.
Interestingly, while Hindus feel close to multiple deities being a non-monotheistic religion, many of them said that they feel that "God is one, with many manifestations".
According to the survey, 61 percent Hindus said that they believe in "one God, with manifestations" whereas only 7 percent Hindus said that they believed in multiple Gods.
A majority of Muslims, Sikhs and Christians said that they believe in one God alone, which is not surprising given that the three are monotheistic religions.