India began on Monday its Maha Kumbh Mela, or Great Pitcher Festival, which is expected to draw more than 400 million visitors to the northern city of Prayagraj over six weeks, making for the largest gathering of humanity in the world.

Maha Kumbh Mela or Great Pitcher Festival begins in India on Monday, a Hindu sacred event that will be the world's largest gathering of humanity as it showcases religion, spirituality, tourism and crowd management.

Scores of naked Hindu ascetics smeared in holy ash charged into the water of holy rivers in northern India yesterday, dreadlocks flying, during the first “royal bath” of the Maha Kumbh Mela, or Great Pitcher Festival.