15 dead in India stampede to catch trains to Hindu mega-festival

At least 15 people died during a stampede
at a railway station in India’s capital late Saturday when surging crowds
scrambled to catch trains to the world’s largest religious gathering, a
medical official told AFP.

The Kumbh Mela attracts tens of millions of Hindu faithful every 12 years to
the northern city of Prayagraj, and has a history of crowd-related disasters
— including one last month, when at least 30 people died in another stampede
at the holy confluence of the Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati
rivers.

The rush at the train station in New Delhi appeared to break out Saturday as
crowds struggled to board trains for the ongoing event, which will end on
February 26.

“I can confirm 15 deaths at the hospital. They don’t have any open injury.
Most (likely died from) hypoxia or maybe some blunt injury but that would
only be confirmed after an autopsy,” Dr Ritu Saxena, deputy medical
superintendent of Lok Nayak Hospital in New Delhi told AFP.

“There are also 11 others who are injured. Most of them are stable and have
orthopaedic injuries,” she said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was “distressed” by the stampede.

“My thoughts are with all those who have lost their loved ones. I pray that
the injured have a speedy recovery,” he continued in a post on X.

The governor of the capital territory Delhi, Vinai Kumar Saxena said disaster
management personnel had been told to deploy and “all hospitals are in
readiness to address related exigencies.”

Railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said additional special trains were being
run from New Delhi to clear the rush of devotees.

The six-week Kumbh Mela is the single biggest milestone on the Hindu
religious calendar, and officials said around 500 million devotees have
already visited the festival since it began last month.

More than 400 people died after they were trampled or drowned on a single day
of the festival in 1954, one of the largest tolls in a crowd-related disaster
globally.

Another 36 people were crushed to death in 2013, the last time the festival
was staged in Prayagraj.

AFP