PRAYAGRAJ, India — Grieving households cremated their family members whereas others cared for his or her injured family members in hospitals on Thursday, a day after a stampede killed a minimum of 30 individuals and injured 60 others on a riverbank on the Maha Kumbh pageant in northern India.
The Uttar Pradesh state authorities ordered a retired choose to research the stampede and submit his findings inside a month as hundreds of thousands of Hindus continued the showering ritual with out a break as a part of the pageant in Prayagraj.
A lady wept uncontrollably as an ambulance left a hospital mortuary for the cremation web site.
Sharvan Kumar Chaudhary, an injured pilgrim on a stretcher in a hospital ward, mentioned, “I fell through the stampede. I used to be with a buddy who introduced me right here.”
Rakesh, who makes use of one title, is looking for lacking relations who got here on the pilgrimage with out him.
“My spouse, aunt, and kids got here for a shower, and so they have been lacking for the reason that Jan. 28 night,” he mentioned.
Witnesses mentioned that spiritual chants turned to screams and cries for assist as hundreds of pilgrims dashing to a sacred river confluence jumped barricades erected for a procession of holy males in Prayagraj, trampling these ready for his or her flip to wash within the river.
Wednesday was a sacred day within the six-week Hindu pageant, and authorities anticipated a file 100 million devotees to have interaction in a ritual tub on the confluence of the Ganges, the Yamuna and the Saraswati rivers. Hindus consider {that a} dip on the holy web site can cleanse them of previous sins and finish the method of reincarnation.
Practically 400 million persons are anticipated in Prayagraj for the pageant over 45 days, making it the world’s largest spiritual gathering. The variety of individuals is greater than the inhabitants of america and round 200 instances the two million pilgrims who have been in Saudi Arabia for the annual Hajj pilgrimage final yr. The pageant began on Jan. 13.
