In the chill of the evening by the banks of the Bhagirathi River near Uttar Kashi, the stars are beginning to show as Mahant Shankar Puri raises his voice in high pitched praise of Shiva, lord of the snows. It is time for arat4 to mark the moment of cosmic transition from day to night.
Three hundred and fifty kilometres to the east, a pilgrim is on his way from the bazaar town of Doti for darshan with the eminent sage who lives in the high and isolated Khaptad plateau of west Nepal. He quickens his pace to get through the dense jungle.
A further 300 kilometres east of Khaptad Baba's ashram, Shanta Maya Majarjan, 45, is returning home to the Kathmandu suburb of Thankot in a crowded evening bus. She has just been to Nagthan, where she propitiated the serpent deity that, she says, has been responsible for the severe pain in her chest and alms.
Hira Lal Tamang, 27 from the village of Khopasi east of Kathmandu, is engaged in another kind of daily religious ritual. He is assisting his elder brother, a fully initiated jhankri, invoke the patron deity Mahadev to exorcise the demons that are causing a young girl to suffer from severe pneumonia.