Magh Mela

In the south, a notable festival is at the Mahamaham tank in Kumbhakonam; in the east, at Sagar island of West Bengal and Konark, Puri.

[7][8] According to Diane Eck – professor of Comparative Religion and Indian Studies, these festivals are "great cultural fairs" which brings people together, tying them with a shared thread of religious devotion, with an attendant bustle of commerce, trade and secular entertainment.

They include the ritual bathing as well as prayers to ancestors, religious discourses, devotional music and singing, charity, cultural programs and fairs.

[15] It is popularly known as Maghi, and it now marks the memory of the forty martyrs during a Muslim-Sikh war (1705 CE) during the time of the Guru Gobind Singh.

[17] According to Pashaura Singh and Louis Fenech, Guru Amar Das built Goindwal Sahib as a Sikh pilgrimage site (tirath).