Not Every Jain Order Wears It the Same Way

Practice around the muhpatti is not uniform across Jainism, and the differences track the same fault lines as other points of Jain monastic custom. Sthanakvasi mendicants typically keep the cloth tied on continuously, while Terapanthi practice and other orders vary in whether it is bound in place or held and raised only when speaking.

Image worshipping Svetambara and Digambara lineages, by contrast, do not require the muhpatti as constant wear in the same way, since their monastic discipline expresses the same non harm principle through other practices. Laypeople of the orders that use the muhpatti most strictly may put one on during specific rituals, such as certain forms of worship or fasting observance, without adopting it as everyday dress the way an ordained mendicant does. Cort's study of Jain religious values describes these variations as a live marker of sectarian identity within Jainism, something a practicing Jain recognizes at a glance, in the same way that vestment differences mark denomination within Christianity, rather than as a minor variation in accessory. A layperson who wears the cloth only during a specific rite generally removes it immediately afterward, unlike the mendicant for whom it is not an occasional gesture but a constant condition of monastic life.