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Death toll mounts after religious stampede
Denver News.Net
Tuesday 30th September, 2008
Nearly two months after a similar tragedy, at least 150 people were crushed to death in a stampede on Tuesday at an ancient hilltop temple in Rajasthan, India.
Nearly 150 people were also injured, some of them critically, in the stampede at the Chamunda Devi temple inside the imposing Mehrangarh Fort.
While officials maintain the death toll is 150, reports coming from the three hospitals where the bodies were taken put the toll at over 195.
The reason for the stampede is still unclear, but eyewitnesses blamed it on the heavy rush of devotees and a tussle among them to reach the temple doors as they were first opened on the first day of the auspicious Navratri festival.
However, the police say it was caused because a barricade collapsed.
On Aug 3rd, 145 people were killed in a stampede at the Naina Devi shrine in Himachal Pradesh in the Himalayan foothills.
State Home Minister G.C. Kataria has said the death toll could rise as many of the critically injured were battling for their lives in hospitals.
The disaster took place around 6 a.m., less than three hours after the temple, built in 1460, opened for prayers.
According to one account, 8,000 to 10,000 men, women and children were gathered in the complex at the time of the accident, all using a narrow pathway leading to the temple.
Almost all the dead were believed to be males, because the stampede took place in the male section of two parallel and winding barricades set up on a pathway on the mountain slope.
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