The "World's dirtiest man" has died in Iran at age 94, shortly after having his first bath in over 60 years, local media reported Tuesday.

The man, known by local residents as "Uncle Haji," lived in Dezh Gah in the southern Fars province of Iran, according to The Jerusalem Post. Haji believed that being clean was harmful to a person's health and thought he would get sick if he took a bath, the outlet reported.

Villagers revealed he had experienced "emotional setbacks in his youth" that led him to refuse to wash, according to Iran's IRNA news agency, which the BBC cited.

Haji avoided fresh food, regularly ate roadkill, and smoked a pipe filled with animal excrement. It was further revealed his favorite meal was porcupine, that he drank unsanitary water drunk from an old oil can and that he lived in a hole in the ground as well as in a brick shack built by concerned neighbors in the village of Dejgah.

IRNA described Haji as being covered in "soot and pus" from years of not bathing. However, a few months ago, villagers persuaded him to wash for the first time in over six decades. He died Sunday.

The unofficial title of "world's dirtiest man" now goes to an Indian man from a village outside the holy city of Varanasi who also has not bathed for decades. In 2009, the Hindustan Times reported about Kailash "Kalau" Singh who at the time had not washed for over 30 years in an attempt to help end "all the problems confronting the nation." Instead, he would frequently have a "fire bath."

"Every evening as villagers gather, Kalau … lights a bonfire, smokes marijuana, and stands on a leg praying to Lord Shiva," the paper wrote.

"It's just like using water to take a bath," Kalau told the outlet. "Fire bath helps kill all the germs and infections in the body."

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