"30 million people bathed in the Ganges" by Nick Fleming

(view more photos from the Living Divinely exhibition)

"The Maha Kumbh Mela, which took place in January 2001, was a momentous affair.  Although the Kumbh takes place every 3 years, rotating each time amongst 4 locations, the last Maha Kumbh Mela had been 144 years previously.  It is all to do with the alignment of the stars... 

Here was a festival that could only be found in India:  assembled, on a truly epic scale, on the flood plain of the river Ganges a unique mixture of the sacred, the religious, the commercial and the downright bizarre.  In an area of some 50 square miles, just outside Allahabad, a temporary city consisting of thousands of tents, elaborate pavilions, pontoon bridges, pipes, cables, wires and all the paraphernalia to provide the necessities for the multitudes, had been painstakingly constructed.  On this stage, a splendid panoply, representing all strands of the Hindu pantheon had gathered to celebrate at this most auspicious of occasions.

This is the Kumbh Mela, the largest religious festival in the world where some 30 million people bathed in the Ganges on a single day, January 29^th 2001.  The event is held only once every 12 years and lasts 7 weeks.  It attracts the faithful of all castes from all over India and beyond, from the most powerful politicians to the humblest villagers. The colourfully clad monks in their saffron, lemon, red or white cotton robes; the gymnosophists, the warriors of the faith, the wandering sadhus and mendicants; the superstitious, the exotic, the ugly, the magical and the ordinary, they all were there. 

The vast majority were simple village folk who, stiffened by their unshakeable faith, travelled in overcrowded trains and buses, walked for many miles and slept in the open to participate in the rituals, the ceremonies and above all take a dip in the holy waters.   The Sangam, where the rivers Jamuna and Ganges, and according to Hindu mythology the Saraswati meet, is the focal point of the festival.  It is here that the pilgrims came to wash away all their sins.  For it is said that to submerge ones body at the time of the Kumbh will cleanse you and all your ancestors back to the eighty- eighth generation of all sin and evil.

Despite the ceaseless noise and seeming endless crowds, out of the chaos, there were moments of individual reflection and of private reverence; it is to those that I levelled my camera.  Every single person had their own reasons for being there and for a day, a few days, a week or longer they nourished their spiritual needs.  Just by being there and performing their own act of worship they all knew that they had fulfilled their own personal pilgrimage."

Nick Fleming

(view more photos from the Living Divinely exhibition)