Want to make an offering to Vishnu? In India, there’s an app for that

If you need to make an offering to a Hindu god, there’s an app for that in India. It’s called ePuja. Today, the startup behind that Android app announced it has raised US$3 million in VC funding from Brand Capital, an ad-for-equity private investment arm of the Times of India Group.

ePuja offers access to religious ceremonies and remedy rituals across 3,600 temples in India.

People can visit the site or use the app to choose a pooja (meaning an act of worship) based on the deity, temple, or even a remedy for a specific problem. For example, offerings to Vishnu for achieving professional goals, or to Hanuman for curing illness.

The site and accompanying app also provide details on the listed temples, such as a history, location details, and its rituals. The startup’s customers can then order and pay for the pooja on the site. Users can make payments via credit or debit card, net banking, or a bank deposit.

Holy ecommerce

The company has tied up with trusts of temples who make the offerings to the deities and then package the prasad, a food offering later shared among devotees. The prasad is delivered to the customer via courier services. It partnered with multiple logistics services for home delivery.

Hanuman is the Hindu monkey god; pictured on a street in Bangalore, India.

“ePuja offers not just access to remedy through rituals and religious ceremonies, but also educates Hindus about the significance of the ceremony,” says Chetan Merchant, founder of ePuja. “We want to rebuild faith and also encourage the younger generation to actively participate and know more about [the] significance of religious practices in an engaging ecosystem,” he adds.

The six-month-old startup claims to have received 500 bookings since it launched in January this year. The fee starts at INR 500 (US$8) per offering and can go up to INR 54,000 (US$845) for specialized offerings.

ePuja competes with Shubhkart, an ecommerce portal for spiritual goods. It was launched earlier this year by television channel Sanskar TV. The site also allows users to book offerings across several temples in India. Besides Shubhkart, ePuja competes with Online Prasad, which has raised funding from Hyderabad Angels and Chennai Angels.