Even as the Nabakalebar Rath Yatra was held with a great deal of fervour and in conformity with the schedule on Saturday, three stampedes left two dead and five injured, three of them seriously, while one drowning case in the sea was also reported. The two killed in the three stampedes were women. The mishaps took place while pulling of the Taladhwaj Rath of lord Balabhadra.
According to reports, the first stampede occurred at about 5 pm while the Taladhwaja Rath was being pulled.
At Hindi School along the Badadanda about 30 people fell down while others trampled over them killing one on the spot. Another was received dead at the hospital and two seriously injured were sent to the SCB Medical College and Hospital as their condition grew critical.
In another such incident near Marichikot Square, two women were injured and were being treated in the Puri district headquarters hospital.
In yet another stampede at the Hospital quare, one male devotee, aged about 60 years, was critically injured when he fell down and others trampled on him. He was also sent to the SCB Medical College and Hospital under serious condition.
This apart, one youth died in Puri sea while bathing. All the injured persons and deceased were not identified till filling of the report. While the one deceased woman is aged about 65 years, the other one is about 45 years old and the youth died of drowning is aged about 25 years.
Far from an expected crowd of at least 30 lakh devotees for the Nabakalebar Rath Yatra, only about 10 lakh, normally witnessed in any annual Rath Yatra, came to the pilgrim town to participate in the Nabakalebar Rath Yatra, where the deities rode on their respective chariots along the 3-km-long Badadanda for a nine-day sojourn at their aunt's house, the Shree Gundicha temple.
Despite tall claims by the State police regarding high-tech crowd management system for the entire city through CCTV monitoring from an integrated control room, it helped little in containing stampeding. The administration expecting congregation of 30 lakh devotees had deployed 45 platoons of policemen for crowd control.
Senior residents attributed the cause of stampede to the extraordinary large multilayer perimeter thrown around the Raths. The area of the perimeter was not flexible according to the width of the Badadanda. The devotees were pushed back by the police to maintain the cordon area, leading to the stampedes.
All was going well till pulling of Raths. The first Rath Taladhwaja rolled at about 3.35 pm as per the schedule followed by Darpadalan of Devi Subhadra and Nandighosh of lord Jagannath. Earlier, ceremonial Phandi of the deities and other set of nitees and rituals were completed by the temple servitors before the prescribed time. The Chhera Pahanra on the three Raths by Gajapati Dibyasingha Dev and darshan by the Shankaracharya were also completed on time.
The pulling for the day was suspended by the evening and it would resume on Sunday morning. While the Taladhwaj reached the Gundicha temple gate, the Darpadalan was at Badasankha and the Nandighosh stayed near Balagandi.
Two devotees die in fall from running train
Two devotees were killed when they fell down from the train they were travelling in while coming to Puri to witness the Rath Yatra. According to reports, three persons fell down from the train. Two died on the spot while one was seriously injured. The injured was rushed to hospital in a critical condition. The deceased and the injured were yet to be identified.