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(Reuters) - Hindus across India this week celebrate the two-day festival of Holi, which marks the beginning of spring, with an explosion of colors, chanting of devotional songs and prayer.

For many, the festival, also known as the “festival of colors” or the “festival of love,” which began on Wednesday, is a time to laugh, forgive and mend broken relationships.

During the festival, participants sing and dance and shower each other with flower petals and brightly colored powders of pink, yellow, blue and green.

Smiling college students smear their faces with green, yellow and red powder, some in a trance-like state under a cloud of pink.

Inside their temples, priests spray pink and gold colors at hundreds of Hindu devotees with their arms raised in prayer as they sing religious hymns.