Gautama Buddha mainly walked in the region of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in India. One thing we need to understand is that Buddha’s path turned into Buddhism, a religion, only after his time. During his time, it was just another among many spiritual movements in the country.He wanted to bring spiritual seeking in a widespread way in the land because, when he came, what was once a very spiritual nation had become very ritualistic, so hetried to transform the situation. Later on, the more enterprising disciples which were mainly Brahmins , made it into a package called Buddhism, but Gautama himself never said anything that could be turned into a religion.Buddha’s way and the traditional yogic systems are not any different. Gautama himself, during those eight years of his seeking, went from Yogi to Yogi. So, in India,people saw him as one more Yogi.This is why Buddhism did not grow in India as it did outside the country.Outside this culture, people had never heard such wisdom. It was so fresh and new because people had never applied themselves in that direction. So, entire nations turned to Buddha’s way. But in India, they had many options ­– this was just one among many.Jainism was also there which was equally powerful as Buddhism.

By then, Buddhism in India had absorbed much of the yogic and tantric cultures and had become a blend of these things, because Buddhism per se, as it was taught initially, is too dry. It was for the monks, not for the general population. So, along the way, a few enlightened beings made a nice blend of yogic and tantric cultures, weaving it into the Buddhist way of life.Many of the later teachers went to Tibet not so much by choice, but more because when the Islamic invasions happened in northern India, the first thing that was attacked were the spiritual places. So, people moved into the Himalayas and went further into the Tibetan plateau.

It is the biggest falsehood perpetrated by various vested interests (such as Indian leftists, Ambedkarites, Hinduphobic western academia, etc), that Buddhism’s first followers were the “lower castes and undesirables”.

For a big part of Buddhism’s early history, the only converts were the most elite people from the uppermost castes of the time.Buddha was able to preach and travel far and wide only because his best friends were Kshatriyas, just like him. His closest friend, king Bimbisara of Magadha, hugely patronized Buddha in his kingdom and promoted him by giving royal support and resources for travel and preaching.When Buddha became a wandering preacher, he would take turns staying at the palaces of each of his four king friends — king Bimbisara of Magadha, king Udayana of Vatsa, king Prasenajit of Kosala, and king Brhadratha of Kashi. Each of these kings were rulers of big empires in Buddha’s time. Although Buddha himself came from a tiny republic (Shakya) that was based on democracy, he moved away from such republics and spent most of his preaching days among monarchies, and under the patronage of the elite kings . Buddha’s first followers were these four kings, who encouraged their subjects to follow his teachings. His closest discipleand life-long companion, Ananda, was a Brahmin. Most of his prominent disciples were Brahmins and Kshatriyas.

It is well-known that Ashoka sponsored missionaries to spread Buddhism in various countries.So spread of Buddhism happened in a top-down model, and not a bottom-up model. It was not a grassroots movement.

Buddha was against inclusion of women in his monastic order. He refused to ordain women as nuns in parallel to men monks, because according to him, women were intellectually inferior, and would only cause disturbance and ruin the discipline of the male monks. So much for the touted “gender equality” revolt of Buddha.

When Buddha was on the last stage towards his mahAparinirvANa (death for liberation), his disciples and Shakya kinsmen asked him for some final advice. Among other things, he told his kinsmen to adhere to age-old traditions, customs and social framework. He never once said anything about disrupting the social fabric. He never once said that the so-called “lower castes” are being oppressed. He never once said that the “lower castes” must rise in revolt against “upper castes”.There is nothing in Buddha’s teachings that promote upheaval of the social status quo of his time.

Buddha Teachings were nothing new.They were revival of the teachings of Upanishadic sages. At the time of the Buddha there was no “Hinduism” there were many schools of philosophy called Darśanas (Perspectives of Reality) including materialists (cārvākas) and there were the Vaidika ceremonial practices and also the customs, practices and traditions of the various Jatis. The predominant “religion” of the time is referred to as “Brahmanism” by scholars. The Buddha never uses the words “Hinduism” or “Buddhism” in his teaching -he uses the word Dharma or Sanātana Dharma.Buddha studied under gurus of the Sankhya tradition but found their teachings and practices to be unsuitable and went off on his own to meditate. After a prolonged period of austerity he obtained “enlightenment” i.e. gained insight into the nature of bondage and liberation. Most of his early disciples were Brahmins.The Buddha repeatedly mentioned and acknowledged the Hindu Devas (especially the 33 Devas) throughout his discourses. He also mentions the Vedas but only three Vedas - the Atharva seems not to have been known. He also mentions the varnāśrama Dharma but what he rejected was the teaching that either the Vedic rituals or the Devas could liberate us from samsāra and duḥkha or that jatis was relevant to the overcoming of suffering.

He emphasized that we need to liberate ourselves and that neither rituals nor the grace of the devas could do that for us. In this respect his teachings were very much in conformity with many of the Upanishadic sages.So the Buddha could not have rejected “Hinduism” - he spoke in the broad context of the cultural milieu of the time while accepting many of the given facets of the culture that later coalesced into modern “Hinduism.”Both Hinduism and Buddhism were terms and divisions of colonialism. Both traditions refer to themselves as “Sanātana Dharma”.

The the idea that Buddhists do not believe in God or gods is a western fabrication.Buddhists even today worship many deities - there are more deities in the Tibetan Kalachakra than in the Hindu pantheon - even though many of them appear in the Kalachakra pantheon as well. Above the doorway of every Thai Buddhist temple is a statue of Vishnu on Garuda.the idea that Buddhists do not believe in God or gods is a western fabrication. Here is an example of a Buddhist prayer.

Here is an example of a Buddhist prayer from Dhammapada

Transference of Merits to All Celestial Beings

May all beings inhabiting space and earth, Devas and Nagas of mighty powers. Having shared this merit Long protect the Teaching!

May all beings inhabiting space and earth, Devas and Nagas of mighty powers, Having shared this merit Long protect me and others!

May all Devas share this merit, which we have thus accumulated for the acquisition of all kinds of happiness and prosperity!

May all Bhūtas share this merit, which we have thus accumulated for the acquisition of all kinds of happiness and prosperity!

This is an excerpt from the Mahā Jayamangala Gātha

 May all good fortune come my way

May all the deities protect me By all the power of the Saṅgha

May I always enjoy well being

 By the power of this protective recital May my misfortunes due to stars,

Demons, harmful spirits and ominous planets Be prevented and destroyed

May rain fall in due time May there be a rich harvest

May the world be prosperous May the government be righteous

DD Kosambi in his 1965 book 'The Culture and Civilisation of Ancient India in Historical Outline' admits that Pali records started by making Indra and Brahma respectful hearers of the Original Buddhist discourses.

These terms like Jainism,Buddhism,Hinduism are the result of Colonial Creation in 19 century as a result of classifying people for conversion purposes by British. In reality,In Dharma Tradition,There is no such term as Conversion. It is an idea in Monotheistic religions becoz they r based on Commandements ,based on one Prophet one Book which is said by God. The Dharmic Religions r a result of inquiries of individuals in different periods of history who have attained Enlightment n Self Realization and expereinced Divinity ..India known by its org name Bharat had many sages who taught Dharma in their own unique ways .Buddha n Mahavira were one of them.Many of those sages could have started an ‘–ism’ in their names. they did not..Buddha never created Buddhism. It was always confined to Monasteries among Elitis,It was Emperor Ashoka a few hundred years after Buddha, who was intent to make people follow what Buddha had preached. In reality,Buddhism n Jainism were exclusivist groups meant for Enligghtment n Self Realization.These terms like Buddhism ,Hinduism r new introduced by the British, and does not do justice to the great variety of views, of philosophies, of gods, of rituals and to the huge body of knowledge that is contained in the Vedas,Dhammapada,Tripitikas n many other books, which includes ‘worldly’ subjects like medicine, economy, astronomy, mathematics, architecture, arts and so on. In fact People in old times never saw a dichotomy between worldly and sacred .They never felt the need to pledge that they only follow one particular human being. They were free to choose what suits them best to connect with the Divine.becoz they were seeking for attaining Enlightment n Self Realization..Sanatana Dharma or universal law is all-inclusive in nature and does not exclude anything. This way of life is not an organized belief system but a science of Self Realization. there were no theocratic states in this culture; the ruler had his religion and the subjects had the freedom to follow theirs. There was no conflict because people did not look at religion as an organized process.in this culture, there has never been anything called persecution for spiritual people. At the most, they called you for debates and asked you questions.Because the pursuit is truth, so people sat down and argued whether what they knew was true or what the other person knew was true. If his truth was more powerful than yours, you become a part of him. If your truth was more powerful than theirs, they would become a part of you. It was a very different kind of search. People were searching to know. They were not just believing and trying to prove that their belief was right.There is no belief system to this way of life. Someone believes in God, someone else can choose not to believe in God.There is no Buddhist or Hinduist.These terms were created by Abrahamanics.The conversion to another religion is an abrahamanic idea.

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan was a philosopher and a former president of India. In his book “Indian Philosophy”, which is considered a classic, he presents his main hypothesis for the decline of Buddhism.

“The vital reason for the disappearance of Buddhism from India is the fact that it became ultimately indistinguishable from the other flourishing forms of Hinduism, Vaishṇavism, Śaivism and Tantrik belief.

Mahāyānism was unable to acquire the prestige of primitive Buddhism, and so proved weak and vacillating in its conflicts with Brāhmanical religion… Throughout its conquests it did not aim at the suppression of other religions, but tried to suffuse them with its own ethical spirit.

Early Buddhism included Indra, Brahma and other divinities. The new converts carried into it much of their reverence for the old gods. The Hīnayāna accepted Brahma, Visṇu and Nārāyaṇa in their own names. The Mahāyāna, we have seen, never seriously opposed itself to the Hindu doctrines and practices. It elaborated the mythology and spoke of a hierarchy of divine grades and capacities, at the head of which was Ādi Buddha. While the Brāhmins looked upon Buddha as an incarnation of Visṇu, the Buddhists returned the compliment by identifying Visṇu with Bodhisattva Padmapāṇi, called Avalokiteśvara. Religion became a private affair, and the Brāhmin ascetics were looked upon as the brethren of the Buddhist śamanas. Brāhmanism and the Mahāyāna faith affirmed identical philosophical and religious views.

The Mahāyāna metaphysics and religion correspond to the Advaita metaphysics and theism. In serving the needs of a large majority of men, it became only a feeble copy of the Bhagavadgītā.A gradual process of intellectual absorption and modification developed to such an extent as to countenance the theory that Mahāyānism was only a sectarian phase of the great Vaishnava movement. The Hīnayāna, with its more ascetic character, came to be regarded as a sect of Śaivism. Buddhism found that it had nothing distinctive to teach. When the Brāhmanical faith inculcated universal love and devotion to God proclaimed Buddha to be an avatar of Visṇu, the death knell of Buddhism in India was sounded.

Buddhism died a natural death in India.”

The main points of Radhakrishnan are

1. Mahāyāna Buddhism became indistinguishable from Vedic Hinduism with it’s plethora of deities and practices.

2. There was mutual acceptance and assimilation of Mahāyāna and Vedic Hinduism – acceptance of Buddha as an avatar of Visṇu by the Vaidikas and acceptance of Visṇu as a Bodhisattva by the Mahāyānas.

3. Philosophically too, Buddhism and Advaita Vedanta become hardly distinguishable.

4. Thus, Buddhism dissolved into Hinduism.

This is highly probable, given the way Buddhism spread to East Asia and beyond. Wherever it went, it took the local form, a fact mentioned by Radhakrishnan too. Having dabbled in Chinese Buddhism for a while, I see very little distinction between Chinese Buddhism and Chinese Paganism, especially in the mode of rituals. Buddhism appears like a Chinese religion in China and a Japanese religion in Japan. Similarly Buddhism eventually blended into mainstream Indian religion. Much of today’s Hinduism is heavily Buddhistized. Radhakrishnan eloquently puts it:

“The best things of the world die before they are re-born, and even so has Buddhism perished in India, to be born again in a refined Brāhmanism. Buddha today lives in the lives of those Indians who have not given up their past traditions. His presence is felt in all around. Throughout worshipped as a god, he has a place in the mythology which is still alive, and so long as the old faith remains without crumbling down before the corrosive influence of the new spirit, Buddha will have a place among the gods of India.”

Pandurang Vaman Kane, a notable Indologist and Sanskrit scholar, rebuts the claim that Buddhism disappeared in India due to persecution by Hindus. He provides numerous examples of Islamic persecution of the people of the lands they conquered and contrasts it with both Hindu and Buddhist kings allowing all religions to flush and even Hindu kings funding Buddhist monasteries. He shows the general pattern of religious tolerance prevalent in pre-colonial India. This theory of Buddhists being persecuted by Hindus is today the pet theory of the Marxists, who use it to justify the persecution of Hindus by Muslims. Kane has provided ample evidence against it and discussing it could be a blog post by itself.

Kane’s reasons for the decline of Buddhism can be summarized as follows

1. Buddhism becoming indistinguishable from Hinduism and thus the two merging into one another. This is the same hypothesis provided by Radhakrishnan.

2. Internal corruption and strife in the monasteries resulting partially from them becoming too wealthy due to generous donations of the people. Swami Vivekananda also spoke about this. People soon grew disillusioned with the monks and Buddhism.

3. Islamic invasions delivered the death blow to Buddhism.

“From about the 7th century A.D. Buddha began to be recognized by Hindus as an avatāra of Vishṇu and by the 10th century Buddha came to be so recognized throughout India by almost all Hindus.

When Buddha came to be worshipped by Buddhists as God, when Buddhists gave up the original characteristic doctrine of the attainment of peace and bliss of nirvāna in this very life through the eradication of selfish desires by following the Noble Eightfold Path, when Buddhists adopted the doctrines of bhakti and the ideal they set up was the evolution of Bodhisattvas through aeons by good deeds, the line of demarcation between Buddhism and popular Hinduism became very thin and was gradually obliterated.”

Here, Kane’s reasoning is similar to that of Radhakrishnan.

About internal corruption in the monasteries, he mentions:

“Monasteries of Buddhist monks and nuns became in course of time centres of idleness, pleasures and immorality… A well-known scholar like Rāhula Sānkrtyāyana, himself a Buddhist bhikśu, In a paper on ‘Vajrayana and the 81 Siddhas’ contributed to the Journal Asiatique vol. 235 ( 1934 ) pp. 209-230 was constrained to say “The monasteries and temples were gorged with riches due to the pious offerings made by the multitudes. The life of the monk became more comfortable than that of the layman. The discipline weakened and many unfit persons entered the community. The easy life associated with the culture of a sensual art under the cover of cultured paintings, meditation, gods and goddesses must have inclined the minds towards sensuality.”

I tend to agree with this reasoning since monasteries being a center of wealth was one of the motivations of Islamic invaders to desecrate and plunder them. The critique of Buddhist monks living in comfort and luxury isn’t new. In the 9th century C.E., Jayanta Bhatta, a Nyāyika, in Āgamaḍambara, which is a satirical Sanskrit play, lampoons a sect which is a parody of Buddhism, for this reason. Though, I would not be as harsh as Kane, since his views seems to mainly come from one perspective (I don’t question Kane’s integrity or his scholarship. He is undoubtedly one of the best historians India has ever had).

Kane then talks about the devastating effect of Islamic invasions.

“Moslem fanaticism and invasions of India delivered the coup de grace (final blow) to Buddhism about and after 1200 A. D. by ruining famous universities like those of Nalanda and Vikramasila and the monks were mercilessly killed in large numbers. Those who escaped the carnage fled to Tibet and Nepal. H. M. Elliott’s History of India (as told by its own historians) vol. II p. 306 contains a passage from Tabakat-i-Nasiri about Bakhtiyar Khilji that states that Bakhtiyar led his army to Behar and ravaged it, that great plunder fell in his hands, that most of the inhabitants of the place were Brāhmanas with shaven heads, that they were put to death, that large numbers of books were found and it was discovered that the whole fort and city was a place of study (madrasa). The description indicates that that Brāhmana with shaven heads were Buddhist monks.

When Moslem invaders exterminated the monks, the laity became bewildered and were either converted to Islam or became slowly absorbed among Hindus.”

It is also no coincidence that Afghanistan and Kashmir which were once flourishing as hubs of Buddhism are now plagued by Islamic jihad and human suffering.

There has been a Lie propagated about Persecution of Buddhists by Hindus-Marxist historians who have been perpetrating this falsehood have not been able to produce even an iota of evidence to substantiate the concoction.. the contention that "the Hindus destroyed Nalanda Buddhist university".

This is a plain lie: under several Hindu dynasties, Nalanda flourished and was the biggest university in the world for centuries; it was destroyed by the Muslim invader Bakhtiar Khilji in 1200. But if you repeat a lie often enough, it gains currency, and now many Indians have come to believe that Buddhism had been replaced by Hinduism as India's chief religion in a most violent manner. In reality, Buddhism had always been a minority religion in India, confined to nobles and traders; before its disappearance around 1200 AD, it had been partly reabsorbed by mainstream Hinduism; otherwise it co-existed peacefully with other Hindu sects, often sharing the same temple- complexes. The historical allegations of violent conflicts between mainstream Hinduism and Buddhism can be counted on one hand. It is not Brahminical onslaught but Islam that chased Buddhism from India. In Central Asia, Islam had wiped out Buddhism together with Nestorianism, Zoroastrianism, Manicheism, and whatever other religion it encountered. The Persian word for idol is but, from Buddha, because the Buddhists with their Buddha-status were considered as the idol-worshippers par excellence. The Buddhists drew the wrath of every Muslim but-shikan (idol-breaker), even where they had not offered resistance aganinst the Muslim armies because of their doctrine of non-violence. As a reminder of the Buddhist past of Central Asia, the city name Bukhara is nothing but a corruption of vihara, i.e. a Buddhist monastery; other Indian names include Samarkhand and Takshakhand, i.e. Tashkent. In India, Buddhism was a much easier target than other sects and traditions, because it was completely centralized around the monasteries. Once the monsteries destroyed and the monks killed, the Buddhist community had lost its backbone and was helpless before the pressure to convert to Islam (as happened on a large scale in East Bengal).

This is what Arun Shorie called in his book eminent Intellectual- How history was made up at Nalanda by Marxists

How history was made up at Nalanda

Koenraad Elst has debunked Shunga myth of Buddhist persecution in his blog

Why Pushyamitra was more "secular" than Ashoka

Dr BR Ambedkar has described this in his book

· There can be no doubt that the fall of Buddhism in India was due to the invasions of the Musalmans. Islam came out as the enemy of the 'But'. The word 'But' as everybody knows, is the Arabic word and means an idol. Thus the origin of the word indicates that in the Moslem mind idol worship had come to be identified with the Religion of the Buddha. To the Muslims, they were one and the same thing. The mission to break the idols thus became the mission to destroy Buddhism. Islam destroyed Buddhism not only in India but wherever it went. Before Islam came into being Buddhism was the religion of Bactria, Parthia, Afghanistan, Gandhar, and Chinese Turkestan, as it was of the whole of Asia. In all these countries Islam destroyed Buddhism.B. R. Ambedkar, "The decline and fall of Buddhism," Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, Vol. III, Government of Maharashtra. 1987, p. 229-30

· The Mussalman invaders sacked the Buddhist universities of Nalanda, Vikramshila, Jagaddala, Odantapuri to name only a few. They razed to the ground Buddhist monasteries with which the country was studded. The monks fled away in thousands to Nepal, Tibet and other places outside India. A very large number were killed outright by the Muslim commanders. How the Buddhist priesthood perished by the sword of the Muslim invaders has been recorded by the Muslim historians themselves. Summarizing the evidence relating to the slaughter of the Buddhist Monks perpetrated by the Musalman General in the course of his invasion of Bihar in 1197 AD, Mr. Vincent Smith says, "The Musalman General, who had already made his name a terror by repeated plundering expeditions in Bihar, seized the capital by a daring stroke... Great quantities of plunder were obtained, and the slaughter of the 'shaven headed Brahmans', that is to say the Buddhist monks, was so thoroughly completed, that when the victor sought for someone capable of explaining the contents of the books in the libraries of the monasteries, not a living man could be found who was able to read them. 'It was discovered,' we are told, 'that the whole of that fortress and city was a college, and in the Hindi tongue they call a college Bihar.' "Such was the slaughter of the Buddhist priesthood perpetrated by the Islamic invaders. The axe was struck at the very root. For by killing the Buddhist priesthood, Islam killed Buddhism. This was the greatest disaster that befell the religion of the Buddha in India..

·B. R. Ambedkar, "The decline and fall of Buddhism," Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches, Vol. III, Government of Maharashtra. 1987, p. 232-233 with quote from Vincent Smith

When Buddhists passively succumbed to the Ms onslaught, it was left to Brahmins to manage their Mahabodhi temple for centuries. But being far more pampered than other Hindus in Nehruvian India, they don't even show any gratitude. they behave like self-centred spoiled brats.

The Mahabodhi story illustrates where the stories of Buddhist "Stupas" turned into Mandirs come from. When the Buddhist monks fled or were killed, their (surviving) temples were continued by Brahmins, & the peripheral Buddhist-made doorkeeper-Shiva was turned into the main deity

There is this myth propagated that Ashoka left Hinduism and adopted Budddhism which is complete SCHAM. Ashoka adopted Buddhism but that doesnot mean he left anything,He was a fervent propagator of Hinduism in his kingdom.