Pepsi signs, Suzuki stalls and a Palmolive soap balloon above the

Sunday Herald, The, Jan 21, 2001 by Nick Meo at the Kumbh Mela

FOR millions of devout pilgrims the Maha Kumbh Mela offers the promise of salvation, but for the marketing men it is a golden opportunity to sell. This first Kumbh Mela of the millennium has been marked by an unprecedented corporate presence as foreign and Indian companies crowd in to try and reach millions of potential customers with a barrage of advertising and free gifts.

Pepsi has festooned the area leading up to the festival grounds with signs, thanks to a tie-up with the state government which has made it the principle advertiser.

Honda and Suzuki have set up stalls showcasing tractors, water pumps and mopeds, desperate to reach the rural masses drawn from across India.

The man from Honda was upbeat: "We've had 10 orders for water pumps today. The Kumbh is a great way to reach farmers who come here on pilgrimage."

Nescafe are pushing a "Kumbh special offer", a free steel bowl if you buy enough instant coffee.

And the sky above is full of giant balloons advertising a whole range of products. The most eye-catching is Palmolive's giant bar of soap floating above people who have come here to bathe in the holy waters.

Company representatives tour the vast tent city that is home to pilgrims, saints and holy men, selling packets of Parle biscuits and traditional Indian medicine. Medimix Ayurvedic soap gives away pocket calendars with pictures of the gods on the back.

Dozens of neat men from Fair and Lovely face cream, wearing a uniform of anoraks and baseball caps, distribute free sachets with enthusiasm - even puzzled holy men in loin cloths with matted hair have the beauty product thrust into their hands.

There's the ramshackle market selling the sort of tacky souvenir pictures of gods and saints that spring up at any Indian religious fair, but what's new is the big companies getting in on the act. The commercial side is toned down in the main mela area but it has been a source of unease for the devout.

Kapil Muni, an English-speaking holy man who is attending his third mela, said: "There's definitely a new sense of commercialism here. But the Kumbh Mela is so big and the devotion is so powerful, it doesn't really affect its heart."

In some ways it was inevitable that corporate India would catch up with the world's biggest gathering. This is the first Kumbh Mela since the economy opened up in the early 1990s and aggressive modern marketing techniques were introduced to India's previously sleepy corporations.

To be fair, it's not just the companies that are doing it: sects, saints and gurus are competing in a huge spiritual market, trying to attract the devout with the same methods as the marketing men - posters, blaring loudspeakers and dubious claims.

The state administration is cashing in too. They had to foot the huge bill for the mela and are doing their best to claw some money back by selling advertising. The official Uttar Pradesh government website aggressively milks the Kumbh for all it's worth. "The Kumbh Mela 2001 offers probably the best business opportunity of the millennium," it promises grandly.

The website lists charges for shop space and a whole range of advertising opportunities, the prices of kiosks and banners, hand bill distribution, posters, and loudspeaker advertising which adds to the cacophony from all the religious groups blasting out hymns and moral exhortations at top volume.

The company that has drawn much of the flak over the commercialisation is British - travel agent Cox and Kings.

They're only one of a number of firms offering five-star accommodation, at a price. One promises the chance to sleep in a "quiet lemon and mango orchard, a few miles from the Kumbh". The UP government has set up "Swiss cottage" style tents, and decent hotels have jacked room prices up. Wealthy Indian tourists and pilgrims are staying in upmarket tents as well as foreigners.

Cox and Kings drew the wrath of Sadhus because it has such a high profile and marketed itself so aggressively.

The company's now infamous luxury tents, at $481 for two nights, enraged the holy men who decided such sinful activities as meat- eating and alcohol-drinking were going on inside. The mela authorities ordered the travel agent to pull up its tents and leave, threatening to strand the upmarket tourists and Hollywood stars who wanted the spiritual experience without forgoing their creature comforts.

The company, which denies serving meat or alcohol and claims it is promoting spiritual tourism by bringing a new type of visitor to the Kumbh Mela, has appealed to the courts.

But the row goes to the heart of what is happening to the Kumbh Mela and the fear of traditionalists that one of Hinduism's most holy gatherings could be turned into a tourist attraction for wealthy foreigners.

But for now the Kumbh is big enough, and the devotion intense enough, to absorb the encroachment of business. For six weeks this winter it is the holiest place in India and the centre of an extraordinary religious outpouring.

It only happens on this scale every 144 years, on dried out mudbanks besides the confluence of the holy Ganges and Yamuna. For the devout, the chance to wash away sins at such an auspicious time is not to be missed and the festival exerts an extraordinary power. It draws devotees from all over India and beyond in what will be one of humankind's biggest gatherings. It is thought that up to 70 million will have attended by the time the festival finishes at the end of next month.