Acharya Prashant defines true religion as a state of honesty, awareness, aloneness, and silence. He argues that modern religious festivals, such as Diwali, often lead people further away from this essence. Instead of elevating consciousness, these occasions frequently result in a collective decline in awareness, which he describes as a period of mourning for a truly religious person. He suggests that what is celebrated as religion is often just the loss of righteousness and the perpetuation of social conditioning.