15 killed in stampede at Hindu religious festival

A stampede at the world’s largest religious gathering has killed at least 15 people with many more injured.

Hindu pilgrims gather to take a holy dip in the sacred waters of Sangam, the confluence of Ganges, Yamuna and mythical Saraswati rivers, during the Kumbh Mela festival in Prayagraj on Wednesday. Picture: AFP

A stampede at the world’s largest religious gathering has killed at least 15 people with many more injured.

The six-week Kumbh Mela festival, which attracts throngs of devotees every 12 years to the city of Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh, is the single biggest milestone on the Hindu religious calendar, and millions of people had travelled there to take a dip in the confluence of holy rivers.

Pilgrim Renu Devi, 48, said a huge crowd was moving down a promenade early on Wednesday morning to reach the rivers abutting the festival site.

“I was sitting near a barricade, and during the pushing and shoving, the entire crowd fell on top of me, trampling me as it moved forward,” she said.

“When the crowd surged, elderly people and women were crushed, and no one came forward to help.”

Rescue teams working with pilgrims to carry victims from the accident site weaved through piles of clothes, shoes and other discarded belongings.

Police officials carry a stretcher among piles of personal belongings after a stampede at the the Kumbh Mela on Wednesday in Allahabad, India. Picture: Getty Images

Police were seen carrying stretchers with the bodies of victims draped with thick blankets.

Dozens of relatives were anxiously waiting for news outside a large tent serving as a purpose-built hospital for the festival about 1km from the accident.

Wednesday marked one of the holiest days in the festival, when saffron-clad holy men lead millions in a procession of sin-cleansing ritual bathing at the confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers.

The Uttar Pradesh state government said millions of pilgrims had already bathed in the waterways between midnight and the early morning.

Organisers have likened the scale of this year’s festival to that of a temporary country, forecasting up to 400 million pilgrims would visit before the final day on February 26.

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

AFP