Hold your breath, the Kumbh is nigh

Hold your breath, the Kumbh is nigh

E paperSubscriptionLogin OpinionHold your breath, the Kumbh is nighExclusion is the big highlight of the Maha Kumbh, not counting luxury tents for the well-heeled faithful and other such excessesThe Maha Kumbh Mela

Saiyed Zegham Murtaza Published: 11 Jan 2025, 2:34 PM

'Bigger is better’: bigger bangs, bigger business, bigger bucks.

That seems to be the animating mantra of the Maha Kumbh Mela, a 45-day extravaganza starting 13 January. The last Maha Kumbh was held in 2013, with the UP government claiming to have spent Rs 1,300 crore in making all the arrangements. In 2019, the Ardh Kumbh was allocated Rs 4,200 crore, the then Uttar Pradesh finance minister Rajesh Agarwal told news agency PTI. In 2025, the figure doing the rounds is Rs 7,500 crore, making this Maha Kumbh the costliest ever.

With some expenses being incurred by the Union government and agencies like the Indian Railways, it is not clear if the allocation also covers security, electricity and water supply. While the state government is expected to earn some revenue from the sale of tickets, accommodation and stalls, such collections will be a drop in the ocean. A look at some of the figures reveals the leap between the Kumbh (held every three years) and the Maha Kumbh (held every 12 years).

The Maha Kumbh of 2013 was spread over 1,600 hectares; the Ardh Kumbh (2019) occupied 3,200 hectares; this Maha Kumbh will sprawl over a designated area of over 4,000 hectares. Declared a district for the period of the 45-day festival, an estimated 400 million devotees are expected to attend from India and abroad.

In 2013, the number was pegged at 120 million. For the practising Hindu, a dip at the confluence of the Ganga, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati rivers at Prayagraj (Allahabad) is believed to wash away the sins of many lifetimes. According to Hindu mythology, the churning of the ocean yielded the kumbh or pot of nectar, four drops of which are believed to have dropped at four locations: Haridwar, Ujjain, Nashik and Prayagraj.

The cyclic hosting of the Kumbh mela every three years ensures each site features once every 12 years.

While the faithful come for prayers, many — irrespective of religious affiliation or lack thereof — come for the spectacle. This year, two features stand out. Non-Hindus, specifically Muslims, have been asked to stay away. Not only have Muslim vendors, who traditionally set up stalls, been barred, media reports in Hindi newspapers have cautioned pilgrims not to take vehicles driven by Muslims. No one has protested. A Muslim maulana did cause a stir by claiming that parts of the land being used belong to the Waqf Board, signifying that the land was donated by Muslims for public purposes. (Waqf means just that: a donation.)

The mela is being pitched like a massive PR event. While mandatory cutouts of Prime Minister Modi and UP chief minister Yogi Aditynath have popped up across Delhi and Prayagraj, groups of saints and sects are aggressively promoting a Hindu Rashtra led by Yogi Adityanath as the chosen one after Modi. The commercialisation of the Maha Kumbh is jaw-dropping. A private service provider is reported to have set up 44 ‘super-luxury’ tents at the campsite. Each double-occupancy tent provides heating, running hot and cold water and ‘butler services’.

Guests who book them can ‘meet-and-greet’ sadhus exclusively, as well as avail of yoga, meditation sessions and guided tours of the various akharas. Each of these tents, which advertise panoramic views of the sangam and mela grounds, comes at a nightly pop of Rs 1 lakh! Clearly a pittance for the well-heeled, who seem have snapped them up. All 44 tents are apparently sold out for the six auspicious days, including the three ‘shahi snan’ (royal bath) days of 14 and 29 January and 3 February.

The state government’s allocation for the Maha Kumbh is possibly over and above the Rs 7,742 crore Ganga Expressway that connects Meerut with Prayagraj. The 594 km, greenfield, six-lane, controlled-access expressway is being developed in PPP (public-private partnership) mode, simultaneously in four parts — three by Adani Enterprises and one by IRB Infrastructure Developers.

Prayagraj airport has been upgraded at a cost of Rs 274 crore with the addition of a new terminal building and the expansion of the apron where planes are parked. In 2019, 500 special trains were enough to service the Ardh Kumbh; in 2025, that number has been doubled. The state roadways will ply 7,000 buses on the highways that lead to Prayagraj and run around 550 shuttle buses from the city to the mela grounds.

The Public Works Department (PWD) was assigned the construction of 400 km of temporary roads and 30 pontoon bridges over the Ganga. The state power department was instructed to install 67,000 LED lights and 2,000 solar hybrid lights, as well as two new power substations and 66 new transformers to ensure uninterrupted power supply during the 45-day event. The Uttar Pradesh Jal Nigam has laid a 1,249 km line to supply drinking water, besides installing 200 water ATMs and 85 water pumps.

Sources claim the installation of 160,000 tents and 150,000 toilets (to be serviced by 15,000 sanitation workers) have been completed. In addition, seven riverfront roads, seven bus stands, nine paved ghats and 12 km of temporary ghats are under construction. More than 1.5 million square feet of murals and street paintings have been commissioned by the Prayagraj Mela Authority and over 2,000 CCTV cameras installed across the Maha Kumbh site and Prayagraj.

Added attractions include food courts and amusement areas for children.

For this makeshift city within a city, the administration is setting up a 100-bed central hospital, two 20-bed sub-centre hospitals, 25 first-aid posts, and keeping 125 ambulances on standby. If only India’s under-served regions were lavished this kind of attention. Surveillance will naturally be ‘advanced’ and ‘extensive’, with underwater, intercepter and tethered drones adding to human eyes.

Pilgrims will be tracked through ‘attribute-based search cameras’. RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) wristbands will monitor each pilgrim’s entry and exit time, while a mobile app will track their location around the clock. Will the deployment of 40 per cent additional forces over the previous Kumbh and all the gizmos faithfully listed on the government website be enough to ease worries about crowd control and erase memories of 36 pilgrims killed in a stampede at Allahabad railway station in 2013? Who will watch the hackers and mischief-makers who have technology at their fingertips?

On 4 January, Ayush Kumar Jaiswal, a 22-year-old student from Bihar, was arrested for issuing a bomb threat. Using a fake Instagram profile, with the assumed name of Nasir Pathan, Jaiswal warned of a bomb attack during the Maha Kumbh that would kill a thousand people. Mercifully, he was apprehended, but there are many Jaiswals on the loose today. People who belong to the much-hated, easily reviled minority community can only hope for a peaceful end to the Maha Kumbh. Those living in Prayagraj are bracing to stay indoors, or, if they can afford it, spend the next month-and-a-half away from their home town.