Long ahead of holding of the festival, the saffron ecosystem and its UP and Central governments were busy creating the hype of it being the most propitious occasion for attaining salvation according to the Hindu almanac. It was advertised that the 2025 Maha Kumbh Mela was special because it was the result of a rare alignment of the Sun, Moon, Jupiter, and Saturn. Besides the sacred geography of Prayagraj made this year's event especially momentous. It is held at the confluence of the Ganga, Yamuna, and Saraswati rivers and has been recognized as part of Intangible Cultural Heritage by UNESCO.

The saffron strategists marketed the event in a skilful manner to the maximum advantage of the big business and corporate houses and at the same time arouse the religious passion of the Hindus for political gains. The conventional Hindus took their words of being living embodiment of India's timeless traditions, history, and cultural identity, as gospel truth and rushed to Prayagraj. The saffron ecosystem and its marketing strategists were successful in their mission as crores of spiritual Hindus took dip every day in the Triveni Sangam.

With Hindutva slogan of Narendra Modi losing its charm and relevance, RSS and BJP needed some other issue and occasion to survive and for acceptability. Only last year the RSS publicly confessed that Modi has lost the ability to mobilise religious sentiments for political gains. Naturally deepening economic distress and growing disparities conjured the RSS and BJP to look for some alternate. Losing Lok Sabha election has turned RSS more desperate. LS elections had sent a strong signal that Modi can no longer carry his party’s fortunes on his shoulder single-handedly.

RSS which has been on the mission to remove Modi from power and has been striving hard to build its base in the Dalits and OBCs also planned to use the occasion to reach out to this section. It had taken out nearly 8,000 students of the average age of 10 years from SC communities for “Kumbh Darshan”. It was done with the am to ensure that these students become familiar with Hindu traditions, Indian culture and are prevented from “falling prey” to religious conversions.

UP chief minister with the aim of effective marketing held the cabinet meeting at Kumbh site and took bath with his cabinet ministers January 22. Holding meeting of the state cabinet at the religious site and then taking a ritual bath “for purification of sins” virtually amounted to providing official recognition and patronage to a religious event which otherwise should have been a personal act of devotion.

How commercial interests were intertwined with the religious celebration could be seen in Gautam Adani’s distributing food in a tent and sponsoring one crore copies of a collection of prayer songs. The two stampedes leaves no scope for ambiguity religion is well entrenched in the driving seat. India and Indians will have more thriving pilgrimage centers to promote the commercial interest of the saffron ecosystem and rightist forces. Look at the manner in which the rightist icon Donald Trump has been using politics to promote business. He is even against India giving space to he business interest of his own aide Musk.

True enough it was the political compulsion that forced Yogi and also both the strongmen Modi and Amit Shah to take dip in the holy Triveni. What made them scary was, BJP not losing the seats, but the danger of it losing its credibility and political relevance; the reversal of the process of political ascendency and losing the core base of majority-Hindu voters. The BJP had got 36 seats while the opposition INDIA alliance won 43, including 37 by Samajwadi.

In its hurry to emerge as the new face of Hindutva who had the political capability to represent the aspirations of Hindus and lead the party, UP chief minister, Yogi Adityanath forgot to adhere to the basic security measures and ethos. This has been exposed by the CPCB which in its report had said that faecal coliform and biochemical oxygen demand levels did not meet the bathing criteria during monitoring carried out in the second week of January.

A bench of NGT chairperson Justice Prakash Shrivastava, judicial member Sudhir Agarwal, and expert member A Senthi Vel were hearing the matter on the compliance of a December order, wherein it had directed the UP government and the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) to ensure that water quality in rivers Ganga and Yamuna was fit to drink and bathe in during the Kumbh. It pulled up the UP Pollution Control Board of not filing an action taken report in compliance with its December 23 order.

The CPCB report on water quality in the Ganga at Kumbh had said, “River water quality was not conforming with the primary water quality for bathing with respect to faecal coliform at all the monitored locations on various occasions. A huge number of people (are) taking a bath at Prayagraj during Maha Kumbh Mela in the river, including auspicious bathing days, which eventually leads to an increase in faecal concentration.”

This CPCB report exposed the utter contempt of the RSS and BJP leadership towards the religious beliefs and commitment of Hindus and simply treats them as a tool to win the elections and come to the power. The UPPCB even tried to get exonerated of the crime by saying that it had filed a compliance report. It even tried to say that the CPCB was lying by seeking to know the exact locations from where they collected water samples. This prompted the bench to ask whether they were disputing the CPCB’s report.

Realising the intensity of erosion of credibility and image from this revelation, Yogi has launched counter diatribe against the expose. Nevertheless it ought to be mentioned that a day after being reprimanded by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) for delay in submitting action taken report on maintaining water quality in Prayagraj for the Mahakumbh, the UP Pollution Control Board (UPPCB) tendered unconditional apology on Tuesday along with the report.

Yogi countering the NGT version told the state assembly only yesterday that the UPPCB has been continuously monitoring the water quality at the Sangam and it is fit for both bathing and ritual drinking (aachman). He held; "This time, 81 drains have been tapped, treating 261 MLD (million litres per day) of sewage. In January and February, faecal coliform levels at the Sangam nose were found to be within the acceptable range, below 2,500 MPN per 100 ml, according to the UP Pollution (Control) Board". He said the Maha Kumbh 2025 is being organised in a "grand" manner, while the 2013 edition suffered due to the "corruption, mismanagement", administrative negligence and chaos of the SP rule. For the 2025 event, 14 flyovers, nine permanent ghats, and seven riverfronts have been prepared. The length of temporary ghats has increased from just 4 km in 2013 to 12 km in 2025, he added.

The Kumbh Mela was being used by RSS and BJP as an opportunity for outreach, especially to build ties with sections of society which did not vote for the BJP. Undeniably this has been a very disturbing convergence of state and religion. The worst has been their blatant attempt to hide the actual number of devout Hindus who died in the stampede. It appears speaking lies and falsehood are the basic traits of the saffron ecosystem. Not only Modi or Mohan Bhagwat were accused of speaking lies. The stampede has also made bare the fact that Yogi is not far behind these leaders in speaking lies. If his claim that adequate police arrangements were in place at the Kumbh, this nature of stampede certainly would not have happened. (IPA Service)