MORE ECO-CONSCIOUSNESS AT KUMBH MELA

KUMBH MELA: WORLD'S BIGGEST 

HOLY GATHERING AIMS GREEN

http://blogs.wsj.com - The Kumbh Mela, the largest religious gathering on Earth, began Monday in Allahabad, a city in northern India's Uttar Pradesh state. Between 80 and 100 million Hindus are expected to take part in the 55-day festival, bathing at the confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna, sacred rivers believed to cleanse sin and enable devotees to escape the cycle of death and rebirth. Environmentalists and religious leaders, concerned about the impact of such vast numbers of pilgrims camping on 20 square miles of floodplain, are hoping to appeal to the religious consciences of the visitors and encourage them to become more eco-conscious. 
For the first time at a Kumbh Mela, which takes place every three years, there is a "Green Camp" for pilgrims. The camp is backed by India's newly formed Green Pilgrimage Network, which aims to protect pilgrimage sites and make them more environmentally sustainable.

"We started with the concept that we should make this the green Kumbh Mela," said Chidanand Saraswati, a Hindu swami, or holy man, who is leading the eco-friendly camp - Global Sangam - on the banks of the Ganges. "Hindus have always cared for the environment but people have started to forget because of population growth and lack of resources," said the swami, who is also leader of the Parmarth Niketan an ashram in Rishikesh, Uttarakhand. "But when they see their leaders and their gurus going in the green direction, they will follow," he told The Wall Street Journal's India Real Time.
The camp is using recyclable steel plates and utensils instead of plastic. It also has eco toilets, filtered drinking water instead of plastic bottles and will organize litter picking collections and tree planting along the banks of the sacred river. The local government and the High Court in Allahabad have also banned the use of plastic bags at the festival for the first time.

In order to raise awareness of the plight of the rivers at the Triveni Sangam (three river confluence), Kusum Vyas, founder and president of a U.S.-based environmental group called Living Planet Foundation said: “The rising population, illegal sand mining and dams cause a lot of stress on the environment and the rivers are the biggest casualties.” ... “It’s a lack of awareness, there has never been a campaign from the bottom up to educate people,” Ms. Vyas added. The Mela administration, led by the Commissioner of Allahabad,  has installed 35,000 individual toilets at the site, up from just over 20,000 at Allahabad’s last Kumbh Mela in 2001, when a total of 80 million gathered at the Allahabad confluence, where Hindus believe a mythical river, Saraswati, intersects with the Ganges and Yamuna, explains the author of the article, Joanna Sugden, a freelance journalist.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US? 

The Indic environmental ethos declares that all aspects and phenomena of nature belong together and are bound in a physical as well as metaphysical relationship, and views life as a gift of togetherness and of mutual accommodation and assistance in a universe teeming with interdependent constituents. Agenda 21 has to be implemented with this sense of spirituality, morality and universality if religion is to play a significant role in creating and sustaining a momentum for ecological conservation in the hearts and minds of men, women and children. The Indic approach to the environment is even today a part of the living legacy of India. That legacy often seems to be embattled and imperilled all around, and yet it is endowed with an uncanny and time-tested resilience. In that resilience, there is hope and promise for India and the rest of the world.

H. E. Dr Laxmi Mall Singhvi
Former President of the World Congress on Human Rights
“The East is green” - August 1996.
http://www.ourplanet.com/imgversn/82/singhvi.html
http://www.hinduwisdom.info/Nature_Worship.htm

Published by dasavatara das - "Vedic Views on World News"
http://www.vedicviews-worldnews.blogspot.com.ar/

THE MAGIC OF INDIA'S KUMBH MELA

A DAY AT THE HINDU

KUMBH MELA FESTIVAL

www.bbc.co.uk - Monday marks the opening day of the Hindu festival of Kumbh Mela in the northern Indian city of Allahabad. Tens of millions of pilgrims are expected to visit to bathe at the Sang am - the confluence of the Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati rivers. The festival is scheduled to continue until 10 March and is billed as the biggest religious gathering in the world. The festival has been held on the banks of the Ganges for thousands of years. It is at its largest once every 12 years when it attracts tens of millions of people. The BBC's Geeta Pandey is in Allahabad, giving regular updates on how the day progresses.
At 5am, Sangam is a hub of frantic activity. Thousands of pilgrims have already taken a dip in the holy waters, thousands are lining up for their turn and thousands more are walking towards the river front. Although the sky is still dark, the bathing ghats are lit up with thousands of electric bulbs. The air here smells smoky from all the fires which people have burned overnight to stay warm. Among the early bathers was Manidatt Panda from Nepal. "I've washed off my sins," he said, laughing.

At 07am, the first group of Naga sadhus (ascetics) arrived in a colourful procession. Led by naked ash-smeared men with marigold garlands around their necks, they sprinted into the chilly waters of Sangam. Dip over, some came and stood before us in the media enclosure, rubbing coarse river sand onto their bodies. At 07:30 the sadhus from the Niranjani akhara (camp) arrive in a huge procession and get 45 minutes to bathe. 
The group, which has several hundred naked ascetics, has a reputation for being rather unfriendly and they are accompanied by the elite commandos of the RAF (rapid action force). As waves of naked ash-smeared ascetics continue to arrive and sprint towards the river, thousands of bathers in nearby enclosures watch in awe. In a departure from tradition, a large number of women ascetics have also come for a bath at Sangam. Dressed in bright saffron-coloured saris and robes, they seemed to be enjoying all the attention. Meanwhile, in the next enclosure, thousands of ordinary pilgrims - men and women, old and young - are moving in orderly lines for their bathing rituals.

The Kumbh Mela is a mass pilgrimage in which Hindus gather in specific locations along the holy rivers Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical river Saraswati. "India is a land of spectacles, it is a land of teeming millions and a land of an ancient culture and civilisation. I have seen vast crowds assemble but none as big as the millions who flocked to the north Indian city of Allahabad to bathe at the confluence where the cloudy waters of the river Ganges meet the blue waters of the river Yamuna on the most auspicious day of those Melas," says Mark Tully, former BBC India Correspondent. "Faith is the key to the Kumbh Mela. There would be no Kumbh Mela were it not for the faith that draws millions of pilgrims to the Sangam in Allahabad," he explains.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US? 

To bathe in the sangam on the peak days is said to especially purify one's existence and relieve one from the continued cycle of birth and death in the material world after this life. Thus, the importance and good fortune for those who can do this is taken very seriously. This is actually the significance of the Kumbha Mela: It offers the chance to transcend, to reach beyond the endless suffering of material existence and reincarnation and enter the level of liberation, salvation, and immortality. It promises to purify us in the spiritual sense, and merge or become connected with the Divine in all of us. ... In this way, the Kumbha Mela provides a means for the spiritual upliftment of all mankind. It is a time to remember the time honored spiritual knowledge found in the Vedic texts and customs. It is a time when everyone can renew their spiritual unity and values, based on mutual love, brotherhood, compassion, tolerance, and devotion to God.

Stephen Knapp (Śrīpad Nandanandana dasa) :
“The Traditional Legend of the Kumbha Mela”
http://www.stephen-knapp.com  -  http://www.stephenknapp.info/
http://www.stephen-knapp.com/legend_of_the_kumbha_mela.htm

Published by dasavatara das - "Vedic Views on World News"
http://www.vedicviews-worldnews.blogspot.com.ar/