Officials had been preparing for months for the world’s largest religious festival, with around 400 million Hindu pilgrims expected to take part

The Hindu festival that turned deadly in northern India on Wednesday is a religious gathering with deep spiritual meaning for devotees who come by the millions to take a cleansing dip in waters they consider sacred.

Reuters, the news and media division of Thomson Reuters, is the world’s largest multimedia news provider, reaching billions of people worldwide every day. Reuters provides business, financial, national and international news to professionals via desktop terminals, the world's media organizations, industry events and directly to consumers.

Many were feared dead after millions of Hindu pilgrims at a huge Hindu festival in India rushed to bathe in holy river waters.

More than seven people were killed in a stampede at the Maha Kumbh Mela, or Great Pitcher Festival, in the northern Indian holy city of Prayagraj on Wednesday.

Nearly 40 people were killed in India's northern state of Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday and several others injured in a pre-dawn stampede at the Maha Kumbh Mela - a Hindu religious festival touted to be the largest human gathering in the world.

Kumbh Mela is a religious gathering that draws tens of millions of Hindu pilgrims and spiritual seekers from India and across the globe. The event is deeply rooted in Hindu mythol