DHundreds of people have tested positive for the coronavirus amid the crowds currently thronging the banks of the Ganges in India, most without masks for the Hindu pilgrimage to Kumbh Mela, one of the world’s main religious gatherings, announced the authorities on Wednesday.
The virus was discovered in more than a thousand pilgrims in just 48 hours in Haridwar in the state of Uttarakhand (North), where the gathering is taking place this year.
India is experiencing a new outbreak of the virus. Experts blame religious holidays, political meetings and all crowded public places. On Wednesday, the government postponed the school exams scheduled for May-June for 15-18 year olds.
The pilgrims, them, continue to gather en masse for the festivities of Kumbh Mela (“pitcher fair” in Hindi), classified as intangible heritage of humanity by Unesco.
Due to the pandemic, the government this year has restricted the gathering for which tests for Covid-19 are in theory required.
Tens of millions of people take part in this pilgrimage which takes place approximately every three years, alternating in four cities (Allahabad, Haridwar, Nashik and Ujjain) and returns to each of these places every twelve years, with intermediate gatherings in Allahabad and Haridwar. The last was held in 2019 in Allahabad in southern Uttar Pradesh (North).
The virus did not deter pilgrims from gathering in large numbers. Monday and Tuesday, the crowd was crowded on the banks of the river waiting to be able to dive into it. For Hindus, this bath allows them to be purified of their sins and to come closer to salvation.
“Saving” waters
“Our faith is the most important thing for us,” Siddharth Chakrapani, a member of one of the organizing committees, told AFP, and the pilgrims believe that the waters of the Ganges will “save them from the pandemic”.
Of around 50,000 samples taken in Haridwar, 408 tested positive for the virus on Monday and 594 on Tuesday, the Uttarakhand government said.
On Wednesday, Yogi Adityanath, the chief minister of the neighboring state of Uttar Pradesh, announced on Twitter that he was positive for Covid-19.
India on Monday became the second most affected country in the world by the virus in number of cases with 13.5 million infections, overtaking Brazil.
The country of 1.3 billion people showed more than 184,000 new infections on Wednesday in the last 24 hours, the largest increase in one day since the start of the pandemic, bringing the total of cases to nearly 13.9 million.
The daily death toll passed 1,000 on Wednesday for the first time since mid-October.
Curfews as well as restrictions on movement and activities are imposed locally. In Bombay, the country’s financial capital in Maharashtra, subject to more severe containment measures, AFP interviewed migrant workers waiting in a train station.
They explain that they are returning to their homes in other states after the announcement of these restrictions. “Since then, I have no more work, I cannot pay my rent,” one of them, Imraan Khan, told AFP.
14/04/2021 15:03:34 – New Delhi (AFP) – © 2021 AFP
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