At least 50 people were killed and dozens more injured in a stampede during a religious event in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, where thousands of devotees had gathered.
Ashish Kumar, the district magistrate in Hathras, the city where the event took place, told reporters at the scene that most of the dead so far were women and children who appeared to have suffocated in a crush to leave the venue. Local officials suggested that heat and overcrowding had sparked a panic.
“Toward the end of congregation, when devotees were leaving, this incident took place because of very high humidity,” Mr. Kumar said.
Umesh Kumar Tripathi, a medical officer in the neighboring district of Etah, in western Uttar Pradesh, said more victims were being brought to other hospitals.
“The death toll may rise,” Mr. Tripathi said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was speaking at India’s Parliament when news of the incident came in, said the “administration is engaged in relief and rescue work.”
“I assure everyone through this House that the victims will be helped in every way,” he said.
Unverified videos on social media showed a large number of dead bodies, mostly women, in the courtyard of what looks like a government building.
The event, a large Hindu prayer meeting, was organized by a guru locally known as Bhole Baba who has been leading such gatherings for more than two decades. The commotion took place at the end of the meeting.
Rajesh Singh, a police officer in Hathras, said a permit for the event had allowed for 5,000 people. But initial information from the scene indicated that the crowd was much larger than that, he said in a telephone interview. More than 150 people have been admitted to different hospitals, he said.
In India, deadly stampedes with mass casualties during religious pilgrimages are common because of poor enforcement of public safety measures. In recent years, the authorities have increased surveillance of large religious gatherings by deploying more police officers and using drones.
“Both the state and federal governments have failed to develop a sensitive approach toward crowd management. As a nation we are good at drawing crowds but not good at managing them,” Manoj Kumar Jha, a member of India’s Parliament, said. “Every year, these kinds of incidents keep repeating themselves, and we learn nothing.”
Mujib Mashal contributed reporting.
