If you thought Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the most followed leader during the International Yoga Day celebrations on June 21, think again. India’s yoga guru and the owner of the Rs. 5,000 crore Patanjali Ayurved, Baba Ramdev, claims to have created history by leading a yoga session which was attended by one lakh people in Faridabad, Haryana, he said in a tweet.
The Modi-led event in Chandigarh was attended by over 30,000 people this year. During the first International Yoga Day celebrations in Delhi last year, the Prime Minister had led more than 35,000 participants performing yoga at the event.
Ramdev’s event this year, claimed the yoga guru, also got an entry into the Guinness World Book of Records (GWR) with 408 people performing sheershasana (the yoga pose of a headstand). The event is said to have been attended by members of the GWR team in Haryana on Tuesday.
“Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust created new Guinness World Record, of 408 people doing sheershasan together,” Ramdev said in a tweet.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Amit Shah was among the participants who arrived early at the Faridabad venue of Ramdev’s event. The yoga sessions began at 4 a.m and ended at 7.a.m.
A participant, Rohtash Chaudary, is said to have set another world record during the event by doing 51 pushups in one minute while carrying 36.5 kg weight on his back, according to ABPlive.
Here are some other records claimed to have been made on the International Yoga Day:
- KP Ranjana, a 34-year-old advocate by profession and a martial arts student, performed continuous yoga asanas for 53 hours in Tamil Nadu. She broke the record of Uttam Muktan from Nepal who did yoga for 50 hours and 15 minutes in December, 2015.
- In the Rajkot district of Gujarat, nearly 2,000 pregnant women participated in a yoga session, which was described as a world record by Chief Minister Anandiben Patel, the Hindustan Times reported.
- 40 crew members on board a SpiceJet flight performed yoga at 35,000 feet above sea level.
- The world’s highest battlefield, Siachen, saw the Indian Army soldiers performing yoga at 5,700 feet above sea level.
Source: International Yoga Day: Baba Ramdev beats Narendra Modi’s ‘world record’