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1. Kumbh Mela (India)
Thousands of Hindu devotees take dips at Sangam, the confluence of three sacred rivers, the Yamuna, the Ganges and the mythical Saraswati, during the Kumbh Mela Festival, in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh state, India.
Thousands of Hindu devotees take dips at Sangam, the confluence of three sacred rivers, the Yamuna, the Ganges and the mythical Saraswati, during the Kumbh Mela Festival, in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh state, India.
2. What you see in the above picture is just a very, very, small part of the gathering. No single picture can possibly capture the size of the gathering during this festival, which takes place only once every 12 years.
3. The festival is the largest peaceful gathering in the world, and considered as the "world's largest congregation of religious pilgrims." An estimated 120 million people visited the last Kumbh Mela in over a two-month period, including over 30 million on a single day.
4. It has been inscribed on the UNESCO's Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
5. For the 2019 Kumbh Mela, the preparations included a $580 million temporary city over 2,500 hectares with 122,000 temporary toilets and a range of accommodations from simple dormitory tents to 5-star tents, and 800 special trains by the Indian Railway.
6. Kumbh Mela has had numerous documentaries and films based on it. In 2010, CBS News Sunday Morning extensively covered Kumbh Mela, calling it "The Largest Pilgrimage on Earth". Same year, BBC did a special titled "Kumbh Mela 'greatest show on earth'."
The End.
The End.
