Stampedes, a symptom of governance failure

At least 41 people were killed and over 50 sustained injuries on September 27 in a stampede during a political rally in Tamil Nadu. The tragedy has once again highlighted the country’s recurring struggle with crowd safety, exposing persistent gaps in planning, management and accountability at mass gatherings. 

Despite repeated tragedies at religious congregations, political gatherings, sports events and festivals, basic lessons on safety and preparedness remain unheeded, leading to preventable loss of lives.

Earlier this year, a judicial commission investigating the stampede at the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) victory celebration in Bengaluru on June 4, found “gross negligence and dereliction of duty” by RCB, the Karnataka State Cricket Association, event organiser DNA Entertainment Networks Pvt Ltd, and Bengaluru Police. The commission’s report said that authorities allowed the event to happen despite knowing that crowd management was impossible. 

At the centre of crowd safety is The Police Act of 1861, which empowers senior police officers under Section 30 to regulate all public assemblies, grant or withhold permissions, and prevent potential breaches of peace. This Act has been modified and supplemented by state-specific laws to address the evolving needs. Consequently, the police and administrative authorities are responsible for regulating mass gatherings and ensuring public safety. It is imperative that they implement robust protocols to prevent any mishap. The police are trained to manage two primary types of crowds. The first one is spontaneous crowds that form in response to an immediate incident or trigger, such as protests, outbreak of violence or an accident. These situations demand rapid reaction as authorities have little to no advance preparation time. 

The other category involves planned congregations during religious festivals, processions, sports meets or political rallies. These are events where there is generally adequate forewarning. The information may come through intelligence reports, requests for permission or publicity material circulated by the organisers, increasingly, social media outreach. 

Fatalities in the second category of mass gatherings are largely avoidable as there is enough time to put in place necessary measures for their smooth conduct.

It is important to understand where organisers and police go wrong in anticipating and preventing accidents at mass gatherings. Such events bring together large numbers of people in unfamiliar settings and can lead to highly unpredictable situations as the infrastructure set up for them is often temporary and rarely adequate. These venues and roads leading to the venue are often not designed for processing large crowds. Sports events, which are generally held in fixed venues, are an exception. However, cricket stadiums in Nagpur and Mohali were relocated to more open areas as the previous venues faced crowd management challenges due to urban growth around them.

The police tend to look at every crowd or assembly through the lens of law and order, often overlooking safety planning. This approach disregards the distinction between crowd management and crowd control. While often used interchangeably, they require different tactics and operational plans.

Crowd management is a proactive process involving planning, venue assessment, regulating entry and exit, coordinating with stakeholders and ensuring the safe and orderly movement of people. Its purpose is to prevent incidents and ensure public safety. Crowd control, in contrast, is reactive, addressing emergencies and managing escalating situations through physical barriers, arrests, or dispersal, to restore order. 

Prioritising law and order as a contingency rather than the main focus in peaceful events leads to far safer outcomes. Effective safety begins with sound venue design and structured crowd management. Risks arising from poor planning and organisation cannot be offset by operational response and afterthought once the crisis unfolds.

Stampedes in India are often triggered by a volatile combination of excessive numbers, inadequate exit routes, and failure to anticipate crowd surges, especially at religious gatherings which account for the majority of casualties. Planned regulation of crowds is critical to reducing the risk of stampedes.

Crowd accidents are not a recent phenomenon in the country: One of the first recorded tragedies occurred in 1820 in Haridwar Kumbh Mela, killing more than 400 pilgrims.

Two centuries later, poor communication, lack of crowd monitoring technology, undertrained personnel and the tendency to prioritise VIP movement over public safety all continue to amplify risks. Such misplaced priorities lead to congestion and panic. Alongside the threat of stampedes, authorities must also contend with security risks during large events, especially given the twin challenges of terrorism and a delicate communal environment, which heighten the risk of disorder.

Preventive measures

To safeguard lives, proactive measures such as strict pre-registration of participants, real-time crowd data analysis using AI and drones, monitoring social media, and deployment of police and volunteers trained in crowd psychology should be taken at all mass events. Venue analysis must determine its carrying capacity, prioritise multiple entry and exit points, prevent bottlenecks, and maintain clear emergency lanes. Public education on safe crowd movement, frequent emergency drills, and coordinated control between local authorities and event organisers significantly reduce the risks of fatal surges. 

Intelligence inputs, though often collected and analysed painstakingly, are frequently ignored or forgotten in the execution phase. Integrating technology, steadfast regulation and community involvement form the backbone of a robust crowd control regime. 

The Ministry of Home Affairs has recently directed the Bureau of Police Research & Development to undertake an in-depth study of post-Independence protest movements with a special focus on the period after 1974. The effort is expected to map reasons, patterns, outcomes, behind-the-scenes actors and funding trails, leading to standard operating procedures (SOPs) to pre-empt mass agitations driven by vested interests. The mandate includes inter-agency coordination to trace protest-linked money flows, alongside parallel frameworks by central agencies to disrupt terror financing networks and tackle extremism-crime nexuses impacting public order and national security. 

It is imperative that another study is undertaken to formulate detailed SOPs to regulate planned events where mass gatherings are expected, to ensure public safety.

The lessons from recent tragedies are clear: India urgently needs comprehensive, enforceable crowd safety standards where prevention becomes the foundation for protecting lives, rather than relying on reactive policing once disaster has already struck.