Aghori playing with a human skull

The Aghori or Aghora are a Hindu sect believed to have split off from the Kapalika order (which dates from 1000 AD) in the fourteenth century AD. Aghoris base their beliefs on two principles, that Shiva is perfect and that Shiva is responsible for everything. Shiva is thought to be responsible for every rock, tree, animal, and thought.

An aghora baba sits in his hut and pulls out his favourite skull. He flambe's it a bottle of alcohol, lights the concoction and sits around for the food to cook. He has an ash pile of human ash in his hut and even sprinkles some alcohol on the ash, for good measure!

Aghori baba wears the shroud of a corpse, covers himself in the ashes of the cremation ground and always has his hair disheveled or in matted dreadlocks. The Aghoris distinguish themselves from other Hindu sects and priests by their alcoholic and cannibalistic rituals.

Aghori sadhu in Haridwar. He is sitting in his makeshift hut, with a dog entering and exiting. He holds a skull, which he circles in front of him before applying white human ash onto it. He applies the ash to his own forehead and makes a tikka out of it. Meanwhile, a chicken enters his hut from behind!

He's getting ready for his Friday night frat party with the boys! He looks almost like (albeit wilder and crazier!) an Australian aboriginal with the white ash all over his face and the wild hair and unkempt beard. He goes on to smear ash all over his arms in trios of lines...

Burning corpses at Chandi Ghat in Haridwar. Dead bodies are cremated by Hindus, in the open and next to the Ganga or Ganges river, at this cremation ground in one of the holiest of holy Hindu cities of north India. The ashes are then consigned next door, into the river, and have no further journey time, unlike ashes from other cremations that take place across India, which needs to be carried to the Ganges river (ideally).

Cremation ground workers tend to the fires that are burning simultaneously on various different pyres in this open-air cremation ground. This was filmed in the peak of the summer of 2011 - imagine standing next to a cremation fire, with its leaping flames, when the outside temperature is 47 degrees Celcius, even without the fire, and that too as it is measured in the shade!

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This footage is part of the professionally-shot stock footage archive of Wilderness Films India Ltd., the largest collection of imagery from South Asia. The Wilderness Films India collection comprises of thousands of hours of high quality broadcast imagery, mostly shot on HDCAM 1080i High Definition, HDV and Digital Betacam. Write to us for licensing this footage on a broadcast format, for use in your production! We pride ourselves in bringing the best of India and South Asia to the world... wfi @ vsnl.com and admin@wildfilmsindia.com.