The grand success of the “Simhasth Kumbh” that began on 22 April 2016 in Ujjain, one of the most ancient cities of India, and ended on 21 May 2016, resulted in all-round praise for the Madhya Pradesh government under the dynamic leadership of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
Though initial estimates were that over two crore pilgrims would arrive for the mega event, the actual figures were astonishingly higher as around seven crore devotees from across the country and different parts of the world converged in Ujjain to take a holy dip in the Shipra river.
The state government had made massive arrangements for the convenience of devotees and to ensure the smooth conduct of the huge event. What made the Kumbh different this time is that “Simhasth 2016” was perhaps the first “technologically high” spiritual event of this century. Infrastructure and information systems used during the event blended hi-tech safety devices and latest technologies like cloud infrastructure, GPS systems and other innovations.
PREPARATIONS MATCHED GLOBAL STANDARDS
The state government had made massive arrangements to ensure the smooth conduct of the “Simhasth Kumbh”. The state government spent over Rs 3,600 crore on making preparations for the gigantic event. A part of this amount came from the Centre.
About 25,000 police personnel had been deployed for round-the-clock monitoring and crowd management. As many as 500 CCTVs had been installed at 125 different locations. Besides, 60 labrador breed sniffer dogs and horses were used for patrolling. The administration had also decided to put up 55 temporary police stations, 230 watch towers, 130 pan-tilt-zoom cameras, 200 drop gates, 42 parking points and “drone cameras” to keep an eye during Simhasth.
That is not all. Over 2,000 swimmers and 60 emergency motor boats were deployed along the Kshipra river to safeguard the lakhs of devotees who immersed themselves in the sacred river every day.
STUDY OF CROWD DYNAMICS
During the Kumbh, a group of Indian researchers led a global team of experts to understand crowd dynamics using “Big Data” and Internet of Things (IoT) for efficient crowd management solutions.
The “Kumbh Mela Experiment: Measuring and Understanding the dynamics of mankind’s largest crowd” was led by the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, along with the University of Amsterdam and various other national and international academic and industry partners and was funded by India’s Department of Electronics and Information Technology and Netherland’s Organisation for Scientific Research.
