Oprah Won’t Attend Kumbh Mela

It seems unlikely Oprah will be attending the Kumbh Mela after all. We
heard back from Nicole Nichols, a spokeswoman for Oprah Winfrey's TV
network, who said Ms. Winfrey has no plan to come to India.

Oprah Winfrey is used to crowds.

Last year, when she made a star appearance at the Jaipur Literature
Festival, the event saw record crowds. Police barricaded the road
leading to the Diggi Palace hotel, where she was set to speak, while
masses of people pressed around sealed entrances to the venue. Some –
including one of our intrepid reporters– climbed over fences and
flower pots to sneak into the venue and catch a glimpse of her. Others
fled to its upper floors for a better view of the T.V. show host, and
to avoid a possible stampede.

Ms. Winfrey seemed used to that kind of attention. But is she so used
to crowds that she's willing to take on the Kumbh Mela, a Hindu
festival touted as the biggest gathering of people on the planet?

According to the Economic Times today, preparations are well underway
for her trip this month to Allahabad, the Indian city that hosts the
festival.

She'll be going there to tend to her spiritual growth, the paper
reported. "Many celebrities come here to demystify the exotica – Naga
Sadhus et al – but Oprah is coming purely for spiritual reasons," a
person apparently overseeing her visit was quoted in the paper as
saying.

At the Kumbh Mela, devotees dip in holy rivers, which they believe
cleanses their sins. (The big question: Will Ms. Winfrey take the
plunge in the murky waters?)

The Kumbh Mela is one of the few places in the world where Ms.
Winfrey's appearance wouldn't make much of a ripple.

Around 30 million religious pilgrims are flocking to Allahabad, in the
state of Uttar Pradesh, to attend the two-month long festival.

Despite long event planning and serious infrastructure – tens of
thousands of police officers, hundreds of doctors and 18 temporary
bridges – the crowds are intimidating. Relatives routinely lose each
other, and last week 36 people died in a stampede at the local railway
station.

Attending the festival may increase Ms. Winfrey's popularity in India,
which suffered a setback last summer after the airing of her India
special on her primetime series "Oprah's Next Chapter." Many found
the show caricaturized India and were offended when she noted that
Indians "still" eat with their hands.

Ms. Winfrey is not the only celebrity rumored to be attending the
Kumbh Mela. According to the Times of India, others include Hollywood
actor Richard Gere, filmmaker David Lynch and Beatles legend Paul
McCartney – though none of them have publicly confirmed this.

But security worries mean that high-profile guests may cancel. The
Dalai Lama called off his visit to the Kumbh Mela earlier this month,
the Hindu newspaper reported, and Congress Party President Sonia
Gandhi also cancelled her trip for that reason.

WSJ

Message From a Sadhu: Detach From Family to Avoid Sadness

ALLAHABAD, Uttar Pradesh — Do your duty, but stop worrying so much about parents, wife and children.

That was the message of the 60-year-old Hindu mystic Maheshanand Giri from the Shri Panchayati Mahanirvani Akhara as he sat outside of a yellow and red tent set up on the vast grounds of the Kumbh Mela in Allahabad this weekend.

Attachments bring sadness, he said.

Gardiner Harris for The New York TimesHindu mystic Maheshanand Giri at the Kumbh Mela.

"Getting rid of attachments is the first step to salvation," he said, sitting beside a small wood fire. "If your family is sick, if your father dies, then you will feel sadness."

The mystics who come to the Kumbh are part of religious orders that were once mercenary armies that terrified parts of northern India centuries ago, according to William Pinch, a professor of history at Wesleyan University in Connecticut.

"They are the ghosts of armies past," Dr. Pinch said in an interview. "And they were often employed as assassins."

These armies often stole or bought children to fill their ranks, Dr. Pinch said. And the rituals of joining the orders usually involved cutting all ties to family, he said.

"The rituals that they undergo when they join the order are a separation from caste society, which involves a social death," Dr. Pinch said. "The order becomes your family."

Ascetics are often thought by Westerners to be peace-loving monks, but Hindu sadhus generally revere Lord Shiva, who could lift mountains with one finger and was known to sever heads. At the Kumbh, the sadhus brandished ceremonial tridents, swords and spears. Some waved around baseball bats, and their celebrations during the procession to the Ganges were decidedly warlike.

But in his tent, Mr. Giri's message to those who had little appetite for abandoning their family was to take a somewhat more detached view of loved ones.

"With your wife, you should stop having sex after you have your children," he said. "And with your children, you should do your duty but draw a line in your attachment. If you are too attached, you will not be happy."

He said he was particularly angry about the proliferation of pornography through cell phones and the Internet. "The government should do something to stop this," he said.

But a fondness for coffee is allowed, he said, even though some may call it an unhealthy addiction.

"Drinking coffee is your choice. It's not an attachment," he said. "It's O.K. to drink coffee."

NYT