The story
Langalbandh Baruni Snan in Langalbandh/Narayanganj
Langalbandh's Ashtami Snan is a mass Hindu river-bathing pilgrimage on the Brahmaputra in Narayanganj, tied to the Parashuram legend and timed to the eighth lunar day of Chaitra. Past editions have drawn crowds reported near 1.5 million, making it reportedly Bangladesh's only formal Hindu holy-bathing site and one of its largest single-day religious gatherings.
According to the legend attached to this stretch of the old Brahmaputra, the sage Parashuram cut a channel with his plough, or langal, to bring water down from the hills and bathe away the guilt of killing his own mother; the place took the name Langalbandh from that plough, and the bathing ritual that follows from it still draws one of the largest single-day pilgrim gatherings in Bangladesh.