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Rumour of landslip triggered stampede
BLACK SUNDAY: The bodies of victims of the Naina Devi temple stampede kept outside the Anandpur Sahib Civil Hospital on Sunday. (Right) Relatives of the victims.
Bilaspur (Himachal Pradesh): It was a serene, rain-soaked Sunday morning. Over 25,000 people, most of them from neighbouring Punjab, waited for their turn at the hilltop Naina Devi temple, 45 km from here, to offer prayers to the deity.
As men, women and children stood in a serpentine queue, suddenly all hell broke loose. In 15 minutes, between 9.30 a.m. and 9.45 a.m. rumour of a landslip triggered a huge stampede.
Groups of devotees returning from the temple ran down and crashed into pilgrims trekking up the four km road to reach the temple.
Children and women clutching the hands of their near and dear ones got separated in the rush to escape the feared landslide, realising little that they were hurtling to another form of death.
As devotees tried to outpace one another to find an escape route, they tried to jump over the railings along the road leading to the temple.
Coming under massive human pressure, the railings gave way and people fell down along the slope.
Several women and children, who could not jump the railings and stuck to the regular path, were trampled upon, witnesses said.
A few minutes after the stampede, the road leading to the temple presented a horrific scene. Bodies of children, women and men, some of them clutching the offerings they had brought for the deity, lay in the slush.
Distraught relatives were seen searching for their kin among the dead.
As the skies opened up, relief workers comprising temple staff and nearby residents found it difficult to carry the injured to the nearest medical aid centre. — PTI
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