What led to stampede at Maha Kumbh: At 2 am, a sea of devotees from all sides...
The ‘Amrit Snan’ on ‘Mauni Amavasya’ is the most significant ritual of the Maha Kumbh and had expected to draw around 10 crore pilgrims on Wednesday.
This year, a rare celestial alignment called 'Triveni Yog' had occurring after 144 years, amplifying the spiritual significance of the day.
The incident occurred around 2 pm on Wednesday, amid a sea of tightly-packed crowds converging at the Sangam and all other ghats created along a 12-km long range of river banks for the Maha Kumbh.
Drone footage showed millions of devotees, shoulder to shoulder, arriving in the pre-dawn dark at the temporary township in Prayagraj for the holy dip in a river to mark the most auspicious day of the Maha Kumbh Mela. The massive crowd going to take the dip led to the barrier to break at the Sangam. This lead to a stamped-like situation and there was no chance for escape as there was pushing from all sides.
"We came in a batch of 60 people in two buses, we were nine people in the group. Suddenly there was pushing in the crowd, and we got trapped. A lot of us fell down and the crowd went uncontrolled," Sarojini from Karnataka said, weeping outside the hospital.
"There was no chance for escape, there was pushing from all sides," the woman told PTI Videos.
A man from Chhattarpur in Madhya Pradesh said his mother was injured and hospitalised, while a middle-aged married couple from Meghalaya walked away from the crowd, both of them sobbing and narrating to reporters their harrowing experience of getting caught up in the ruckus.
Another woman at the hospital, whose child suffered injuries in the chaos, narrated her ordeal, claiming, "There was nowhere to go. Some people who pushed us were laughing while we begged them for kindness towards the children."
Video and photographs after the stampede showed bodies being taken away on stretchers and people sitting on the ground crying, while others stepped over a carpet of discarded belongings left by people as they tried to escape the stampede, reports Reuters.
However, witnesses said devotees trying to escape it were caught in another stampede at an exit. They then returned towards the pontoon bridges looking for another way out only to find it had been closed by authorities.
"I saw many people falling and getting walked on by the crowd...many children and women getting lost, crying for help," said Ravin, a devotee who gave only his first name and had traveled from the financial capital Mumbai for the festival.
While ordinary devotees continued their holy bath after the incident, the Akharas (monastic orders) called off their traditional 'Amrit Snan' for 'Mauni Amavasya'.