Exposing Spiritual Authority: Patriarchy and Identity Crisis in Anuradha Roy's Sleeping on Jupiter

This paper aims to uncover pseudo-spiritualism which transforms into a form of spiritual capitalism within the socio-religious structure of India depicted in Anuradha Roy's novel Sleeping on Jupiter (2015).Through the depiction of the ashram and its Guruji, Roy interrogates the collusion between religion and society in normalizing exploitation and commodification of religion, its beliefs and especially girl children respectively.The study further implores the fragmented identity of the protagonist, Nomi (Nomita), whose sense of self is decentralised by displacement, spiritual patriarchy, and institutional domination.Through a feminist and psychoanalytic lens, the novel emerges as a powerful critique of spiritual patriarchy and gendered abuse.Drawing on Melanie Klein's Object Relations Theory, the paper analyses how childhood trauma leads to psychological disintegration and emotional alienation.Additionally, the concept of false consciousness from Marxist theory is employed to examine how religious ideology conditions victims into internalizing oppression and to oppose spiritual capitalism.