Justice Katju’s Critique on Modi and Yogi’s Political Agenda of Kumbh Mela

Politicization of the Kumbh Mela

By Justice Katju

I am now in my 79th year, and am from Allahabad where Kumbh Melas are held every 12 years, and Magh Melas every year. 

The first Kumbh Mela I attended was in 1954 when I was 8 years old. Thereafter I have seen such Melas for half a century. 

In these Melas there was bathing in the sangam in the morning, and from the afternoon saints and sadhus coming from all over the country would give ‘pravachans’ ( religious discourses ) on the Ramayan, the Bhagavat Gita, etc, 

But this year something has happened which never happened earlier. 

I have been informed by a friend who personally visited the Mela premises recently that huge posters of Modi and Yogi Adityanath are everywhere, at every nook and corner of the entire premises. 

This politicization of the religious event was never seen before. As I said, I have witnessed Kumbh and Maagh Melas for several decades, but I never saw any poster of any politician like Nehru, Shastri, Indira Gandhi etc before in the Mela premises. 

A huge sum of over Rs 9000 crores has been spent by the  Central and State Governments on this religious event, which is a gross violation of the Constitutional principle of secularism, as well as Article 51A(h) of the Constitution, as explained below, and was obviously with an eye on the next elections in UP and other states

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