Kumbh Mela
Kumbh Mela is a Hindu pilgrimage, celebrated every four or twelve years, correlated with the partial or full revolution of Jupiter. These are held at four locations-Prayagraj, Haridwar, Nashik, and Ujjain, with varying time intervals. As per the Puranas, these sites are considered to have received the drops of the divine nectar during the Samudra Manthana. The Kumbh Mela lasts between one and three months, with the Amavasya day attracting the largest crowds. The festival attracts millions of people, with the largest gathering recorded at Prayag. About 660 million attended the Kumbh Mela in 2025,
and 200 million in 2019, making it one of the largest gatherings in the world. It has been inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
The Kumbh Mela is observed cycle at each site approximately once every 12 years based on the Hindu luni-solar calendar and the relative positions of the Jupiter, the Sun, and the Moon. As per Hindu astrology, specific alignments of the Jupiter, the Sun, and the Moon only occur at the four Kumbh locations in a 12-year cycle. The Prayag and Haridwar festivals are held with a six year gap in between, and feature a Maha and Ardha Kumbh Melas. The Kumbh Melas at Ujjain and Nashik are observed in the same year or one year apart, typically about three years after the Prayag Kumbh Mela.
The festival is held at the confluence of major rivers, and people take a ritual dip in the waters, believed to be a means of prāyaścitta for the past mistakes, and cleansing of their sins. Various fairs, educational events, religious discourses, mass gatherings of monks, and entertainment are also conducted during the festivities.
Before 1858, the name "Kumbh" was applied only to the 12th occurrence of an annual mela in Haridwar during the Vaishakha month. As mentioned in Hindu texts such as Ramcharitmanas, an annual Magh Mela was held in Prayag during the month of Pausha. The Haridwar mela had seen clashes between rival groups in the past, which had resulted in multiple deaths in 1796. After the Indian Rebellion of 1857 had been suppressed by the British Raj, the Pragwals in Allahabad proposed the idea of an organised pilgrimage at Prayag under the surveillance of the British. The first Kumbh Mela at Prayag was organised in 1870
In other parts of India, similar but smaller community pilgrimage and bathing festivals are held. These Magha or Makar melas that have been called Kumbh Mela include those held in Kumbakonam, Kurukshetra, Panauti, Rajim, and Sonipat. These are also generally held at water bodies with various time intervals, and attracts a large gathering. For example, the Mahamaham is held in Kumbakonam once every twelve years, at the Mahamaham tank, near the Kaveri river.
Etymology and nomenclature
The Kumbha in Kumbha Mela literally means "pitcher, jar, pot" in Sanskrit. It is found in the Vedic texts, in this sense, often in the context of holding water or in mythical legends about the nectar of immortality. The word Kumbha or its derivatives are found in the Rigveda, for example, in verse 10.89.7; verse 19.16 of the Yajurveda, verse 6.3 of Samaveda, verse 19.53.3 of the Atharvaveda, and other Vedic and post-Vedic ancient Sanskrit literature. In astrological texts, the term also refers to the zodiac sign of Aquarius. The astrological etymology dates to late 1st-millennium CE.The word mela means "unite, join, meet, move together, assembly, junction" in Sanskrit, particularly in the context of fairs, and community celebrations. This word too is found in the Rigveda and other ancient Hindu texts. Thus, Kumbh Mela means an "assembly, meet, union" around "water or nectar of immortality".
Historical origins
Hindus believe that the Kumbh Mela originated in times immemorial and is attested in the Hindu Puranas about Samudra Manthana found in the Puranas. Historians, in contrast, reject these claims as none of the ancient or medieval era texts that mention the Samudra Manthana legend ever link it to a "mela" or festival. According to Giorgio Bonazzoli, a scholar of Sanskrit Puranas, these are anachronistic explanations, an adaptation of early legends to a later practice by a "small circle of adherents" who have sought the roots of a highly popular pilgrimage and festival.Hindu mythology describes the creation of a "pot of amrita " after the forces of good and evil churn the ocean of creation. The gods and demons fight over this pot, the "kumbha", of nectar in order to gain immortality. In a later day extension to the legend, the pot is spilt at four places, and that is the origin of the four Kumbha Melas. The story varies, with some stating Vishnu as Mohini avatar, others stating Dhanavantari or Garuda or Indra spilling the pot. This "spilling" and associated Kumbh Mela story is not found in the earliest mentions of the original legend of Samudra Manthana such as the Vedic era texts, or the earliest of the Puranas.
While the Kumbha Mela phrase is not found in the ancient or medieval era texts, numerous chapters and verses in Hindu texts are found about a bathing festival, the sacred junction of rivers Ganga, Yamuna and sacred Saraswati at Prayag, and pilgrimage to Prayag. These are in the form of Snana ritual and in the form of Prayag Mahatmya.
History
The first Kumbh Mela event was organised in 1870, under British supervision. Some observers have found similarities between Kumbh Mela and other events that took place in the earlier times.A mention of Prayaga and the bathing pilgrimage is found in Rigveda Pariśiṣṭa. It is also mentioned in the Pali canons of Buddhism, such as in section 1.7 of Majjhima Nikaya, wherein the Buddha states that bathing in Payaga cannot wash away cruel and evil deeds, rather the virtuous one should be pure in heart and fair in action. The Mahabharata mentions a bathing pilgrimage at Prayag as a means of prāyaścitta for past mistakes and guilt. In Tirthayatra Parva, before the great war, the epic states "the one who observes firm vows, having bathed at Prayaga during Magha, O best of the Bharatas, becomes spotless and reaches heaven." In Anushasana Parva, after the war, the epic elaborates this bathing pilgrimage as "geographical tirtha" that must be combined with Manasa-tirtha whereby one lives by values such as truth, charity, self-control, patience and others.
There are other references to Prayaga and river-side festivals in ancient Indian texts, including at the places where present-day Kumbh Melas are held, but the exact age of the Kumbh Mela is uncertain. The 7th-century Buddhist Chinese traveller Xuanzang mentions king Harsha and his capital of Prayag, which he states to be a sacred Hindu city with hundreds of "deva temples" and two Buddhist institutions. He also mentions the Hindu bathing rituals at the junction of the rivers. According to some scholars, this is the earliest surviving historical account of the Kumbh Mela, which took place in present-day Prayag in 644 CE.
Some traditions ascribe Kumbha Mela's origins to the 8th CE philosopher Shankara as a part of his efforts to start major Hindu gatherings for philosophical discussions and debates along with Hindu monasteries across the Indian subcontinent.
Kama MacLean, an Indologist who has published articles on the Kumbh Mela predominantly based on the colonial archives and English-language media, states based on emails from other scholars and a more recent interpretation of the 7th-century Xuanzang memoir, the Prayag event happened every 5 years, featured a Buddha statue, involved alms giving and it might have been a Buddhist festival. In contrast, Ariel Glucklich – a scholar of Hinduism and Anthropology of Religion, the Xuanzang memoir includes, somewhat derisively, the reputation of Prayag as a place where people once committed superstitious devotional suicide to liberate their souls, and how a Brahmin of an earlier era successfully put an end to this practice. This and other details such as the names of temples and bathing pools suggest that Xuanzang presented Hindu practices at Prayag in the 7th century, from his Buddhist perspective and perhaps to "amuse his audience back in China", states Glucklich.
Other early accounts of the significance of Prayag to Hinduism are found in the various versions of the Prayaga Mahatmya, dated to the late 1st millennium CE. These Purana-genre Hindu texts describe it as a place "bustling with pilgrims, priests, vendors, beggars, guides" and local citizens busy along the confluence of the rivers. These Sanskrit guide books of the medieval era India were updated over its editions, likely by priests and guides who had a mutual stake in the economic returns from the visiting pilgrims. One of the longest sections about Prayag rivers and their significance to Hindu pilgrimage is found in chapters 103–112 of the Matsya Purana.
Evolution of earlier melas to Kumbh Melas
Some observers have found similarities between Kumbh Mela and other events that took place in the earlier times.According to James Lochtefeld – a scholar of Indian religions, the phrase Kumbh Mela and historical data about it is missing in early Indian texts. However, states Lochtefeld, these historical texts "clearly reveal large, well-established bathing festivals" that were either annual or based on the twelve-year cycle of planet Jupiter. Manuscripts related to Hindu ascetics and warrior-monks – akharas fighting the Islamic Sultanates and Mughal Empire era – mention bathing pilgrimage and a large periodic assembly of Hindus at religious festivals associated with bathing, gift-giving, commerce and organisation. An early account of the Haridwar Kumbh Mela was published by Captain Thomas Hardwicke in 1796 CE.
According to James Mallinson – a scholar of Hindu yoga manuscripts and monastic institutions, bathing festivals at Prayag with large gatherings of pilgrims are attested since "at least the middle of the first millennium CE", while textual evidence exists for similar pilgrimage at other major sacred rivers since the medieval period. Four of these morphed under the Kumbh Mela brand during the East India Company rule when it sought to control the war-prone monks and the lucrative tax and trade revenues at these Hindu pilgrimage festivals. Additionally, the priests sought the British administration to recognise the festival and protect their religious rights.
The 16th-century Ramcharitmanas of Tulsidas mentions an annual Mela in Prayag, as does a Muslim historian's Ain-i-Akbari. The latter Akbar-era Persian text calls Prayag the "king of shrines" for the Hindus, and mentions that it is considered particularly holy in the Hindu month of Magha. The late 16th-century Tabaqat-i-Akbari also records of an annual bathing festival at Prayag Sangam where "various classes of Hindus came from all sides of the country to bathe, in such numbers, that the jungles and plains were unable to hold them".
File:Ashoka pillar, Allahabad, c.1900.jpg|thumb|left|upright|The Ashoka pillar contains many inscriptions since the 3rd century BCE. Sometime about 1575 CE, Birbal of Akbar's era added an inscription that mentions the "Magh mela at Prayag Tirth Raj".
The Kumbh Mela of Haridwar appears to be the original Kumbh Mela, since it is held according to the astrological sign "Kumbha", and because there are several references to a 12-year cycle for it. The later Mughal Empire era texts that contain the term "Kumbha Mela" in Haridwar's context include Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh, and Chahar Gulshan. The Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh also mentions an annual bathing pilgrimage festival in Prayag, but it does not call it Kumbh. Both these Mughal era texts use the term "Kumbh Mela" to describe only Haridwar's fair, mentioning a similar fair held in Prayag and Nashik. The Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh lists the following melas: an annual mela and a Kumbh Mela every 12 years at Haridwar; a mela held at Trimbak when Jupiter enters Leo ; and an annual mela held at Prayag in Magh.
Like the Prayag mela, the bathing pilgrimage mela at Nasik and Ujjain are of considerable antiquity. However, these were referred to as Singhasth mela, and the phrase "Kumbh mela" is yet to be found in literature prior to the 19th century. The phrases such as "Maha Kumbh" and "Ardh Kumbh" in the context of the ancient religious pilgrimage festivals with different names at Prayag, Nasik and Ujjain are evidently of a more modern era.
The Magh Mela of Prayag is probably the oldest among the four modern-day Kumbh Melas. It dates from the early centuries CE, given it has been mentioned in several early Puranas. However, the name Kumbh for these more ancient bathing pilgrimages probably dates to the mid-19th century. D. P. Dubey states that none of the ancient Hindu texts call the Prayag fair a "Kumbh Mela". Kama Maclean states that the early British records do not mention the name "Kumbh Mela" or the 12-year cycle for the Prayag fair. The first British reference to the Kumbh Mela in Prayag occurs only in an 1868 report, which mentions the need for increased pilgrimage and sanitation controls at the "Coomb fair" to be held in January 1870. According to Maclean, the Prayagwal Brahmin priests of Prayag coopted the Kumbh legend and brand to the annual Prayag Magh Mela given the socio-political circumstances in the 19th century.
The Kumbh Mela at Ujjain began in the 18th century when the Maratha ruler Ranoji Shinde invited ascetics from Nashik to Ujjain for a local festival. Like the priests at Prayag, those at Nashik and Ujjain, competing with other places for a sacred status, may have adopted the Kumbh tradition for their pre-existing Magha melas.