Sadhu with glasses. A sadhu with glasses, saffron color clothes, long white hair and beard is preparing for himself a mixture of charas and tobacco in the riverfront steps of the sacred river Ganga in Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh, India).

Sadhus usually smoke that potent hashish concentrate, made from the resin of the cannabis plant, mixed with tobacco and using a conical pipe chillum, as a part of their worship.

Shiva is the god most commonly linked to cannabis, and this is th reason because charas-smokers consider that the spirit of Shiva enter their bodies when they inhale it.

Shadus are the only ones in India who are exempt from legal prosecution for possesion of this drug.

Devotee taking a spiritual bath. A devotee shows a spiritual trance expression during his bath time in the sacred river Ganga (Varanasi aka Benares, Uttar Pradesh, India).

Everyday, thousand of local Hindu devotees and pilgrims gather on the ghats, the stone steps that lead down to the Ganges River, to take ritual baths to clean their sins. They believe that bathing in the Mother Ganga purifies them, absolves them of their sins, and liberates them from the cycle of life and death.