Kathmandu, Feb 25, 2017: Over 600,000 devotees offered prayers to Lord Shiva till Saturday morning at the Pashupatinath Temple in Nepal on the occasion of the Mahashivaratri festival, media reports said.

The visitors from within and outside the country started pouring into the temple premises from 3.30 a.m. on Friday, myrepublica said.

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Govinda Tandon, member secretary of the Pashupati Area Development Trust (PADT), informed that there were around 600,000 devotees who had offered puja at the temple by 6 p.m. on Friday.

As the main theme of the festival is to stay up all night reciting hymns, the temple remained open till Saturday morning, he added.

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He claimed that around 1.2 million people arrived in the Pashupati area to observe the festival on Friday.

This time, the PADT ended the practice of issuing paid tickets to visitors for prompt access to the temple.

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Sadhus (ascetics) visiting Pashupatinath from India and elsewhere were happy with the festival arrangement, Tandon claimed. There were around 150 Indian sadhus in Pashupatinath on the occasion, he said. (IANS)