What is the shahi snan at this Kumbh?

An अखाड़ा akhada is an order of sadhus with its own head, its own rule, its own property and its own place in the bathing order at a Kumbh. The word originally meant a wrestling ground. At this Kumbh the akhadas bathe in two towns: the Vaishnav akhadas at Ramkund in Nashik, and the Shaiva and Udasin akhadas at Kushavarta in Trimbakeshwar, and why the Kumbh is at two places has that arrangement in full. Three akhadas bathe at Ramkund and ten at Kushavarta, and the akhadas has them by name.

The Shaiva akhadas are led into the water by their naga sannyasis, the ones who go without clothes and cover themselves in ash, and in the processions the nagas carry their spears and swords. A संन्यासी sannyasi is a sadhu who has given up the world. The naga sadhus says who they are. The Vaishnav akhadas come with their flags, which carry the image of Hanuman.

Each akhada has its own place in the arrangement. The order in which the akhadas go is settled beforehand, and each one bathes in its turn and then makes way for the next.

There are three shahi snans in a Simhastha. The first two fall on the same day at Nashik and at Trimbakeshwar, so on those mornings the Vaishnav akhadas are going into Ramkund while the Shaiva and Udasin akhadas are going into Kushavarta. The third is different: it falls on different days at the two towns.

The days are fixed by the तिथि tithi, the day of the lunar calendar, and the authority publishes them. For this Kumbh they are on the main Kumbh page, with what the authority has said about them. In 2015 the three shahi snan days at Nashik were 29 August, 13 September and 18 September, and there were ordinary bathing days around them too, one in the bright half of Shravan before the first shahi snan and one on Vaman Dwadashi after the third. The past Kumbhs at Nashik has 2015 in full.

The third bath is the one where the akhadas come together. At the third shahi snan at Nashik the heads of the three Vaishnav akhadas stay on at Ramkund after their sadhus have bathed and gone back, so that the kund does not fill up, and the three akhadas’ acharyas and mahants meet there at the water. A महंत mahant is the head of an akhada or of a math, and an आचार्य acharya is the teacher at the head of an order.

Through the whole Simhastha the mahants of the three akhadas at Nashik meet, eat together, talk over what is coming and what the old texts say, decide disputes that have been waiting, and discuss appointments in their own orders.

The shahi snan days are not only for the sadhus. They are the days more people come to the river than on any other, and the authority’s plan calls them the पर्वणी parvani days, the days of the parva, the great occasion. Once the akhadas have bathed the ghats are open, and people bathe at Ramkund and along the Godavari at Nashik and at Kushavarta at Trimbakeshwar through the day.

What you see on the way to the river is the procession. On the shahi marg at Nashik, the road the akhadas come down to Ramkund by, there is chanting, feats of strength, drills with weapons and one procession after another, and people line the road to watch. The peshwai has the route, turn by turn, and Ramkund is where it ends.

At Nashik the akhadas come down to Ramkund, the pool on the bend of the river at Panchavati, and the ghats on both banks are where people stand to see them go in. A घाट ghat is the flight of stone steps leading down into a river, and the bank they stand on. At Trimbakeshwar they come through the lanes of the town to Kushavarta, the square kund in the middle of it, and the shahi snan of the Simhastha at Trimbakeshwar is taken there. The Kumbh period opens, months before any of this, with the flag hoisting at Ramkund and at Kushavarta, and the flag hoisting has that.

If you are going to bathe yourself, or only to watch, what to carry to the river has the practical side, and snan says what a snan is and how it stands to the rites for the dead.