A rush hour stampede in Mumbai on a railway bridge killed 22

Deadly stampedes are common at the country’s pilgrimages and religious festivals.(Arabinda Mahapatra/HT File Photo)

HT, 29 September 2017, Mumbai: At least 22 people were killed in a stampede on Friday as commuters pushed and jostled on a Mumbai railway bridge during the morning rush hour.

The cause of the stampede was not immediately known.

Deadly stampedes are common at the country’s pilgrimages and religious festivals. In 2008, 224 people died in a stampede at Chamunda Devi temple in Rajasthan’s Jodhpur. In 2013 a crowd rush at a railway station killed at least 36 Kumbh pilgrims.

Experts say a high tolerance for crowds and crowded spaces in the country has resulted in several similar accidents.

Here is a look at the major stampedes in the country in the past decade:

October 15, 2016: At least 24 people were killed in a stampede in Varanasi. Panic spread as thousands of pilgrims tried to cross a bridge to a sacred site. Rumours about a bridge collapse led to chaos after a man fell down in a crowd.

July 14, 2015: At least 29 people were killed and over 60 injured in a stampede during the mahapushkaram, a Hindu religious bathing festival on the Godavari river bank, in Andhra Pradesh.

Some pilgrims trying to retrieve their shoes that had fallen off in the rush triggered the stampede as tens of thousands of people pushed forward to bathe in the Godavari on the first day of the festival.

October 13, 2013: At least 113 people, including children, were killed and more than 100 injured in a stampede on a crowded bridge leading to a temple in northern Madhya Pradesh, with many of the devotees leaping to their death in the water below.

The incident at the Ratangarh temple in Datia district, 350 km north of Bhopal, brought back memories of a similar stampede at the same place in 2006, when at least 20 devotees had died. It also put the spotlight on poor crowd-control planning by the authorities that have made stampedes a recurrent feature at religious congregations.

February 11, 2013: 37 pilgrims killed and scores injured in a stampede at a railway station in Uttar Pradesh’s Allahabad. The devotees were headed home from the Kumbh Mela.

November 19, 2012: 18 killed and several injured in a stampede on a bridge over the Ganga river during Chhath Puja in Patna, Bihar.

January 14, 2011: 104 pilgrims died on Makara Jyothi Day at Sabarimala in Kerala.

May 16, 2010: Two persons were killed in March 2010 in a stampede triggered by a last-minute change in platforms for two trains at the New Delhi railway station.

Passengers pushed around to move to platform No. 12 with their baggage, which resulted in the stampede. A woman and a child were killed in the incident. Around 15 people were injured.

March 4, 2010: 63 people, mostly women and children, killed in a stampede at a temple in Uttar Pradesh’s Pratapgarh.

September 30, 2008: 224 pilgrims died in a stampede at Chamunda Devi temple in Rajasthan’s Jodhpur.

August 3, 2008: 150 worshippers killed in a stampede at Naina Devi temple sparked by rumours of a landslide in Bilaspur, Himachal Pradesh.

January 25, 2005: 340 people were killed in a stampede at Mandhar Devi temple Maharashtra’s Satara district. The accident happened when some people fell down on the steps made slippery by devotees breaking coconuts.

With inputs from agencies