Haridwar, Uttaranchal,
India
Haridwar (or Hardwar) lies along the Ganges at the boundary between
the Indo-Gangetic Plain and the Himalayan foothills and is the site of the headworks of the Ganges Canal system.
Haridwar is one of the seven sacred
cities of the Hindus and a major pilgrimage centre. It has had
many names; originally it was called Kapila, for the sage who once lived
there. Its present name means "door to Hari," one of the names of Vishnu, a
principal deity of Hinduism. Haridwar's chief object of pilgrimage is Har-ki-Pauri, the
bathing ghat, or steps, along the river. It has what
believers consider to be a footprint of Vishnu impressed into a stone. Large
numbers of pilgrims gather there annually at the beginning of the Hindu
solar year in April; a
Kumbh Mela is held every 12th year. The pictures below are from a relatively minor Hindu festival on 6th June, 2006 (06/06/06). [Adapted from Encyclopedia Britannica.]
Har-ki-Pauri
 |
Festival day
(06/06/06)
 |
Bathers from
far and wide
 |
The bathing
ghats
 |
Open air
bathing
 |
|
Riverside
rituals
 |
Family puja
 |
Putting on dry
clothes
 |
Protesting kid
 |
Tribal woman
 |
Singing old
man
 |
Stepping down
to the river
 |
Riverside fun
 |
|
Frolicking in
water (more)
 |
The gushing
Ganges
 |
Clock tower
area (more)
 |
Three women
 |
Riverside puja
 |
Ritual
offering
 |
Dressing up
 |
Fighting
siblings
 |
Amigos (more)
 |
All dressed up
 |
Lady in red
 |
Big turnout
 |
The ghats and
beyond
 |
Bathing
pilgrims
 |
View from a
bridge
 |
Ghat scene
 |
Photographer (more)
 |
Waiting for
the aarti
 |
Bead shop (more)
 |
Drying off
 |
Albino with
open sores
 |
Tribal woman (more)
 |
Bent old woman
 |
Ghat scene
 |
Wrinkled woman
 |
Ecstatic old
woman with son
 |
Reading the
scriptures
 |
Bathers (more)
 |
Bathing sadhu
 |
Pilgrim on the
ghat
 |
Ritual
offering
 |
Open air
kitchens
 |
Camps by the
river (more)
 |
Makeshift
shrine
 |
Naga sadhus
 |
Worried?
 |
Giant vat of milk
 |
Pickles (more)
 |
Heap of
kum-kum (sindoor)
 |
Praying sadhu
 |
Ritual
offering to the Ganga
 |
Father and
children
 |
Father and son
 |
Another ghat (more)
 |
Loaded
rickshaw
 |
Outside
Haridwar train station
 |
Holiday rush hour
Station road
 |
| |
|
|
|
