The definition of a sadhu is a monk or religious devotee who travels around living a simple lifestyle practicing abstinence from worldly pleasures to focus more on spiritual practice.
During the eight-week Kumbh, generally held every three years in one of four cities in India, the Nagas* live in makeshift monasteries called Akhara erected on the eastern banks of the Ganges.
They spend their days meditating, smoking cannabis and receiving a stream of visitors who come to pay their respects.
*Most of the Nagas enter the orders in their early teens, leaving their friends and families to immerse themselves in meditation, yoga and religious rituals. It can take years to be conferred with the title of a Naga, they say.
“One has to live a life of celibacy for six years. After that the person is given the title of a great man and 12 years after that he is made a Naga,” said Digambar Kedar Giri, a Naga sadhu from Jaipur.
Ash-smeared and dreadlocked Naga sadhus or Hindu ascetics, naked except for rosary beads and garlands and smoking wooden pipes, are a huge draw at the world's largest religious festival that began this week in India.
At the Kumbh Mela, or "festival of the pot", held this year in Prayagraj, in Uttar Pradesh, organisers expect up to 150 million people to bathe at the confluence of three holy rivers: the Ganges, the Yamuna and a mythical third river, the Saraswati.
Reuter’s and
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/ash-smeared-naga-sadhus-a-huge-draw-at-kumbh-mela-see-pics-1433406-2019-01-17
