Kanwar Yatra has been cancelled in Uttar Pradesh, in view of COVID-19, the Uttar Pradesh Government has said.   

“The Kanwar Yatra has been cancelled by the Kanwar Sanghs on the appeal of the Uttar Pradesh government,” Additional Chief Secretary Information Navneet Sehgal said on Sunday.

The yatra was scheduled to start on July 25.

This comes days after the Uttar Pradesh government had decided to go ahead with the yatra. The Centre had told the Supreme Court on Friday that the states will not be allowed to hold the annual Kanwar Yatra this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic and arrangements will be made for providing Ganga water by tankers at specified places.

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The Uttarakhand government has already called off the Kanwar Yatra citing fears expressed by experts of a possible third wave of the pandemic and the risk posed by such gatherings.

Earlier this week, the Supreme Court had issued notice to the Uttar Pradesh government over its decision to allow the Kanwar Yatra.

The court added that people were “perplexed” by the UP government allowing the yatra at a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi and medical experts had warned against large gatherings, and urged people to follow social distancing. India is still reeling under the impact of the deadly second wave of COVID that left more than one lakh people dead. And the authorities are also bracing for the possible third wave.

The top court, which took up the matter suo motu, said, “the right to life is paramount and all kinds of sentiments are subservient to Article 21 of Constitution,” reports PTI. This observation came after the Uttar Pradesh government said that a ‘symbolic’ yatra will be held.

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The Kanwar Yatra is an annual pilgrimage held in the Hindu calendar month of Shravana. Devotees of lord Shiva generally walk bare feet with pitchers of holy water from the Ganga or other holy rivers. The water is taken from pilgrimage sites such as Haridwar, Gaumukh and Gangotri in Uttarakhand, Sultanganj in Bihar, and Prayagraj, Ayodhya or Varanasi from Uttar Pradesh.

The yatra goes on till the first week of August and sees thousands of Shiva devotees called ‘kanwariyas’ travelling mostly on foot from neighbouring states, including Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi to collect water from the Ganges in Haridwar.