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Key Points
- The Maha Kumbh Mela or Great Pitcher Festival is the world’s largest religious gathering.
- Organisers have likened this year’s festival to a temporary country, expecting up to 400 million pilgrims.
- A barrier broke during a holy bath in the city of Prayagraj injuring several devotees.
Rescue teams carrying victims from the accident site weaved through piles of clothes, shoes and other discarded belongings.
Hindu devotees gather ahead of the second sacred bathing ritual, or ‘shahi snan’, during the Kumbh Mela festival. Source: AAP / Prabhat Kumar Verma/EPA
Police were seen carrying stretchers bearing the bodies of victims draped with thick blankets.
“I wish for the speedy recovery of all injured,” he added.
The six-week Kumbh Mela is the single biggest milestone on the Hindu religious calendar.
How did the Kumbh Mela crowd crush happen?
“Mismanagement and the administration’s special focus on VIP movement instead of common devotees are responsible for this tragic incident,” he wrote on social media.
In 1954, between 350 and 800 people died in Prayagraj — reportedly one of India’s worst crowd-crush incidents. Source: SBS News
Railway police superintendent Ashtabhuja Singh told AFP that special train services taking pilgrims to Prayagraj were still running, after earlier reports that they had been halted due to crowding in the city.
Organisers have likened the scale of this year’s festival to a temporary country, forecasting up to 400 million pilgrims would visit before the final day on 26 February.
‘That was all a lie’
Another 36 people were crushed to death in 2013, the last time the festival was staged in Prayagraj.
