By Biswajeet Banerjee and Krutika Pathi
Lucknow, India: Thousands of people at a religious gathering in India rushed to leave a makeshift tent, setting off a stampede on Tuesday that killed more than 120 and left scores injured, officials said.
It was not immediately clear what triggered the panic following an event with a Hindu guru known locally as Bhole Baba. Local news reports cited authorities who said heat and suffocation in the tent could have been a factor. Video of the aftermath showed the structure appeared to have collapsed.
More than 120 were killed in a devastating stampede at a Satsang, or religious event, in Hathras, in India’s densely populated Uttar Pradesh state on Tuesday. Credit: Getty Images
At least 121 people were killed and 31 were injured, according to state authorities, with the dead including 112 women and seven children.
“People started falling one upon another, one upon another. Those who were crushed died. People there pulled them out,” witness Shakuntala Devi told the Press Trust of India news agency.
Relatives wailed in distress as bodies of the dead, placed on stretchers and covered in white sheets, lined the grounds of a local hospital. A bus that arrived there carried more victims, whose bodies were lying on the seats inside.
Women mourn next to the body of a relative outside the Sikandrarao hospital in Hathras district about 350 kilometres southwest of Lucknow, India.Credit: AP
Deadly stampedes are relatively common around Indian religious festivals, where large crowds gather in small areas with shoddy infrastructure and few safety measures.
Police officer Rajesh Singh said there was likely overcrowding at the event in a village in Hathras district about 350 kilometres south-west of the state capital, Lucknow.
Initial reports said organisers had permission to host about 5000 people, but more than 15,000 came for the event by the Hindu preacher, who used to be a police officer in the state before he left his job to give religious sermons. He has led other such gatherings over the last two decades.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi offered condolences to the families of the dead and said the federal government was working with state authorities to ensure the injured received help.
Uttar Pradesh’s chief minister, Yogi Adityanath, called the stampede “heart-wrenching” in a post on X.
He said authorities were investigating.
“Look what happened and how many people have lost their lives. Will anyone be accountable?” Rajesh Kumar Jha, a member of parliament, told reporters.
He said the stampede was a failure by the state and federal governments to manage large crowds, adding that “people will keep on dying” if authorities do not take safety protocols seriously enough.
In 2013, pilgrims visiting a temple for a popular Hindu festival in central Madhya Pradesh state trampled each other amid fears that a bridge would collapse. At least 115 were crushed to death or died in the river.
In 2011, more than 100 Hindu devotees died in a crush at a religious festival in the southern state of Kerala.
AP
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