Take Back Yoga

Take Back Yoga campaign

In 2010, the HAF launched the "Take Back Yoga" campaign as a reaction to alleged cultural appropriation and secularization of yoga by popular press and neo-gurus who according to the HAF "abstained from discussing the origins of yoga in Hinduism and corrupted a Hindu philosophical practice to a mere collection of physical postures", with its cofounder Aseem Shukla writing an opinion piece on the subject to the Washington Post. Particular emphasis was laid on the Hindu nature of yoga manuals across centuries to corroborate claims of yoga being a Hindu form of spiritual quest. Deepak Chopra, a pseudoscientific New Age guru, responded to Shukla's post, and the two had a lengthy exchange on the subject; Chopra argued that calling Yoga a Hindu concept had "tribal" implications.