One of the oldest continuously inhabited cities on earth, where Hindus come to die because dying here is said to end the cycle of rebirth. Confronting, and unlike anywhere.
What it is
A city on the west bank of the Ganges that has been continuously inhabited for at least three thousand years, and which Hindus consider among the holiest places on earth. Shiva is said to have founded it. For a devout Hindu, dying in Varanasi — Kashi — and being cremated on the riverbank grants moksha, release from the cycle of death and rebirth.
The consequence is a city organised around death in a way that is entirely matter-of-fact. There are hospices where people come specifically to wait. Bodies are carried through the lanes on bamboo stretchers past shops that are open. Fires burn at the cremation ghats around the clock and have, by tradition, never gone out.
This is not morbid to the people who live here, and visitors who arrive expecting solemnity often find the ordinariness harder than the grief.
The ghats
Eighty-odd stone stairways run down to the river along about seven kilometres of bank, and walking their whole length is the single best thing to do here.
Dashashwamedh Ghat is the main one and the site of the evening Ganga Aarti — a choreographed fire ceremony with brass lamps, bells and chanting, performed to the river at sunset every day. Get there an hour early or watch from a boat.
Manikarnika Ghat is the principal cremation ground and the oldest. Harishchandra Ghat is the other. Both are working crematoria.
Assi Ghat at the southern end is quieter and where the yoga and the morning classes happen.
A dawn boat from Assi north is the classic experience: the sun comes up behind the far bank, the whole city faces east to meet it, and thousands of people bathe. Agree the price before you get in.
Etiquette at the burning ghats
No photography or video. This is stated on signs and enforced by the families and the doms who run the cremations. It is also simply correct.
Anyone who offers to take you to a “good viewing point” and then asks for a donation to buy wood for the poor is running a very old scam. There is no charity that collects that way.
Watch from a distance, do not step over anything, and leave when asked.
The rest of the city
The lanes of the old city are barely wide enough for two people and are genuinely disorienting. Getting lost is the point; the river is downhill.
Kashi Vishwanath Temple, the holiest Shiva temple, is now approached through a large modern corridor built in 2021. Non-Hindus are restricted in parts.
Sarnath, 10km away, is where the Buddha gave his first sermon after enlightenment. The Dhamek Stupa and the archaeological museum, with the Ashokan lion capital that is India’s national emblem, are a quiet half-day and a complete contrast.
Practical
The water is heavily polluted and has been the subject of a long-running and only partly successful clean-up. Do not swim in it, whatever you see others doing.
It is intense. Touts, boatmen, silk sellers and self-appointed guides are constant near the main ghats. A calm, repeated no works. Book a boat and a guide through your hotel and most of it stops.
