Some 35 lakh people had by 8.30am on Monday taken the holy dip at 44 ghats along a 12km stretch in Allahabad on the occasion of Paush Purnima, a pre-Mahakumbh bathing day.

The numbers are expected to multiply when the Kumbh Mela officially starts on Tuesday, Makar Sankranti, with the first of the three Shahi Snans of this year’s congregation scheduled for the opening day.

As the first lot of sadhus and ordinary devotees took pre-dawn dips on Monday, they worshipped the setting moon and the rising sun.

An estimated 50,000-odd sadhus bathed at the six ghats near the confluence of the Ganga and the Yamuna (Sangam) at 4.32am and another 100,000 in the next three hours.

With these sadhus beginning to leave in batches only around 6.30am, tens of thousands of ordinary pilgrims had either to wait till 7am to reach these ghats or be content bathing in the 38 other ghats away from the Sangam.

On Makar Sankranti, when the sun transitions from the zodiac sign of Sagittarius to Capricorn, the dawn bathers will worship the rising sun. The other two Shahi Snans — recently renamed as Amrit Snans by the state government — are on Mauni Amavashya (January 29) and Basant Panchami (February 3).

First, the Naga sadhus from the various akharas arrive at the Sangam in a procession from their camps to take the holy dip. Only then do the common people have their turn.

“I am happy to see Prayagraj abuzz with countless people coming there, taking the holy dip and seeking blessings,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrote on X.

A dose of glamour was added to the event on Monday when Laurence Powell Jobs, 61, wife of the late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, arrived with a team of 40 to spend a few days at the Kumbh.

Powell, who was in saffron clothes, had visited the Kashi Vishwanath temple in Varanasi on Sunday and received a Hindu name, Kamala, from Kailashanand Giri of the Nirajani Akhara whom she accepted as her guru. Giri adopted her as his spiritual daughter.

The priests at the Varanasi temple, however, asked her not to touch the Shiva Linga.

This was done “in keeping with Hindu tradition”, Kailashanand confirmed. “She will stay at our camp at the Mahakumbh with her team and worship the Ganga. She will be known by the name Kamala,” he said.

Some devotees complained of poor crowd management, frequent changes of the pilgrimage routes without warning, and a lack of coordination between the Mela police and the traffic police.

“Perhaps the cops deployed at the Sangam are new but we are annual visitors to the Magh Mela and know the routes and the real ghats. It’s unfortunate that the police want to mislead us,” Rameshwar Raj Dubey, from Deoria in Uttar Pradesh, told reporters near the Jhusi Bridge. “They are diverting the ordinary devotees far away from the Sangam and claiming they are sending us to the real Sangam.”

Asking not to be named, a photographer said: “The police closed all the pontoon bridges in the Jhusi area except one. But when devotees reached the open bridge, the traffic police forced them to return. Let us see what they do tomorrow during the first Shahi Snan.”

He added: “Sometimes, a devotee has to walk about 15km to reach the Sangam. We are staying in the Mela area but we have to walk 8km to reach the Sangam.”

The political slugfest over the Mela’s alleged politicisation and commercialisation continued. Opposition politicians slammed leaders of the central and state governments for allowing corporate groups to set up their camps and big hoteliers to erect luxury accommodation for the rich at the venue, and accused them of using the religious event for self-publicity.

Trading of about ₹400,000 crore is expected at the Kumbh over the next six weeks before the Mela ends on February 26.

“Making such a display of religion is not good. By setting up a city in Allahabad within six months, the government has proved that it can do genuine development if it wants. But they didn’t do any real work on the ground,” Nagina MP and young Dalit politician Chandrashekhar Azad Ravan of the Azaad Aamaj Party (Kanshi Ram) said.

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav, who said he would visit the Kumbh to make donations, asked BJP leaders to go to the Sangam to “wash off their sins”.

Deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya retorted: “Akhilesh Yadav must remember the mismanagement at the Mahakumbh of 2013 when he was chief minister. It was a sin but let us see if he can wash it off at the Mela.”

The Samajwadi MP from Ghazipur, Afzal Ansari, said: “The Yogi Adityanath government has given a field day to construction contractors. Even sadhus have protested against the looting being done in the name of Mela arrangements.”

BJP sources said they had formed several teams in Allahabad City and the Mela site to protest against Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi and Akhilesh if they decide to visit the Kumbh.

“We are ready to welcome them with black flags and slogans because they are anti-Hindu,” a BJP leader in Lucknow said.