At least 30 people have been killed and scores injured in crowd crushes at the Kumbh Mela festival, Indian police have confirmed, as vast numbers of people went to bathe at one of the holiest sites of the Hindu gathering.
Tens of millions of people flocked to the northern state of Uttar Pradesh to immerse themselves at the sacred confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers on one of the most auspicious days of the Hindu festival.
A senior police officer, Vaibhav Krishna, told a news conference that 30 people had died and at least double that number were wounded in fatal crushes that took place in the early hours of Wednesday.
It is feared the death toll could be higher than officially confirmed. Earlier, officials on the ground said 39 bodies had been brought to a hospital morgue.
According to accounts by devotees, several crowd crushes occurred at about 1am after large numbers of people congregated on the banks where the Yamuna and Ganges river meet in order to take a holy bath in the waters. As the crowd surged in different directions, people began to push their way out and some tried to jump over barriers. Many fell down the river bank in the panic and families who had been sleeping on the ground nearby were trampled.
A number of bodies were seen lying around the banks of the river. Shoes and clothes could be seen strewn on the ground, and there were scenes of desperation at nearby makeshift tent hospitals where the dead and injured were initially brought.
Narayan Singh Lodhi, 50, from Madhya Pradesh, said his sister-in-law Hukam Bhai Lodhi died in the crush after she became separated from her family as they went down to bathe. She had three children, including a daughter who was with her at the festival.
Lodhi said the trouble began when the crowds of bathers going in opposite directions began to collide. “I saw people falling to the ground and shouting, and people started treading on each other,” he said.
“I tried to rescue as many people as possible but I could only get hold of my wife and another woman. I dragged them out. I saw around 20 bodies who were clearly dead on the floor who had been crushed and others were lying there injured crying out for help.”
More than 400 million people – the biggest crowd in the event’s history – were expected to attend this year’s Kumbh Mela festivities, held over 45 days in Prayagraj, in Uttar Pradesh. A record 100 million people had been expected to attend the festival on Wednesday alone, to take part in a particularly auspicious bathing day.
The Kumbh Mela has been promoted heavily by the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, whose face was visible on posters across the event, and he had earlier praised the “extraordinary” and “unforgettable” crowds that were attending. In the aftermath of Wednesday’s crush, Modi called the incident “extremely sad”.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, the Uttar Pradesh chief minister, Yogi Adityanath, did not acknowledge any fatalities at the festival and said the incident had been triggered when some devotees tried to cross over barricades set up by police.
Several relatives of victims placed the blame with police, accusing them of failing to properly control the crowds and causing bottlenecks of devotees in certain areas as some main routes and pontoon bridges across the river were blocked for ordinary pilgrims.
Lodhi was among those who said the deaths were a failure by the authorities. “It’s police who are responsible for this disaster,” he said. “We had planned to take a dip in the river around 4am but they came over earlier and tried to make everyone get in the water quickly and go. It was their fault that everyone went down to the river at once and then they didn’t properly control the crowds. Now people have lost their lives.”
On Tuesday, as numbers attending the festival swelled beyond the authorities’ expectations, announcements broadcast over loudspeakers urged new arrivals to get in the water quickly, dip twice and then leave the site immediately, calling it a sin to do a third dip.
As the sun rose on Wednesday morning, there were frantic scenes at the missing persons booths, where those caught in the crush tried to find missing relatives. Saroj Bhagri, 60, from Madhya Pradesh, was looking for her eight-year-old grandson, Chahat Bhagri. They had only arrived at the festival late on Tuesday night after travelling for 36 hours and were sitting on the floor, sharing some food after taking a holy dip, when the crowd surged on top of them.
“Suddenly people started pushing and falling over us and trampling us. I got up and I was holding my grandson’s hands but then I was pushed down and it got wrenched from me when there was a huge crush.
“All around people were running and screaming but he was gone.”
Manoj Kumar Paswan 45, from Uttar Pradesh, said his 65-year-old aunt, Chanara Prajapat, was missing, after they had gone down to the river in the early hours to bathe. “There was a commotion and people started falling on each other. There was a sudden push that was so forceful that I lost the hand of my aunt,” he said.
“It was a very painful and scary experience. People all around were crying and wailing. There were over a dozen people lying on the floor including children and people were just trampling over them.”
The Kumbh Mela pilgrimage takes place every 12 years and is widely seen as the “festival of festivals” in the Hindu religious calendar in India, attended by a vibrant mix of sadhus, ascetics, pilgrims and tourists.
This year’s celebration is particularly significant as the Maha or grand Kumbh Mela takes place only every 144 years, marking the 12th Kumbh Mela and a special celestial alignment of the sun, moon, Jupiter and Saturn.
