Six persons including a child were killed and at least 20 injured in a stampede in the early hours of Thursday at the famous Kanakadurga Temple in Vijayawada. Two of the injured are in a critical condition, according to the Vijayawada city police. The dead include four women, a man and a child.

Police said that the mishap occurred around 5 am during the annual Bhavani Diksha rituals at the temple. More than 100,000 devotees had congregated on the hill for the last day of the rituals.

The dead have been identified as Rambabu, 8, Lakshmi, 23, Eshwaramma, 46, Ramulamma, 60, Sunita, 38 and K C Babu, 21, hailing from different parts of Andhra Pradesh. Vijayawada police commissioner C V Anand said the stampede occurred when thousands of devotees on the narrow Durga Gudi road tried to surge towards the temple to look at the idol of goddess Kanaka Durga.

Lack of arrangement
He said police had warned the temple authorities on several occasions that lack of proper arrangements could lead to a tragedy but they failed to take necessary precautions. He pointed out that the movement of devotees was limited to one road on the hill, leading to chaos during the rituals.

Minister for Endowments J Ratnakar Rao said that the large turnout of devotees led to the accident. “The turnout was more than expected and as a result the arrangements proved inadequate, leading to the stampede,” he said.

According to estimates, there were at least one lakh devotees thronging the temple, which resulted in the stampede and they were in a hurry to make it to the temple by the auspicious hour.

Witnesses said that the chaos was worsened as there was no police to manage the crowds.

However, the temple authorities blamed the police for not posting enough manpower to manage the crowds.
The government has announced Rs one lakh ex-gratia for the kin of those killed and Rs 10,000 for each of the injured.

The government has ordered a departmental enquiry into the incident. It announced ex-gratia payment to the families of the dead and the injured.