At least 113 people were killed and scores injured Tuesday in a massive stampede at a Hindu temple in the western state of Rajasthan, a senior state official said.
The disaster occurred as more than 25,000 worshippers clamoured to reach the 15th century Chamunda Devi temple in Jodhpur's hill-top Mehrangarh Fort at the start of Navaratri, a major Hindu festival.
"The stampede began when people lost their footing and set off a chain reaction," Rajasthan's Home Secretary S.N. Thanvi told AFP.
"We have 113 bodies in two government hospitals in Jodhpur," said Kiran Soni Gupta, a senior civil servant in the historic city.
Officials said around 150 people were hurt, many of them seriously, and that the death toll could rise further.
Television footage showed devotees carrying limp bodies to police vehicles, with others desperately trying to resuscitate relatives and loved ones.
Temple crushes are common during religious festivities in India, where crowd control is often rudimentary or non-existent.
Officials said the stampede appeared to have started when a wall along the narrow path leading up to the temple collapsed, killing several people and sparking widespread panic.
"I was to join my friend this morning to offer prayers but I was a little late," recalled a dazed Jodhpur university student who gave his name as Manish.
"When I arrived, I saw chaos, people rushing around the place. I looked for my friend and after a while found him. He was unconscious but without serious injuries," Manish told AFP.
He said the path leading up to the temple shrine was narrow with many people trying to get in at the time of the incident, as the auspicious time for offering prayers was about to begin.
Outside the state-run Mathura Das Mathur hospital, relatives scrambled to look through lists of names of those admitted to the emergency room, witnesses said.
Scenes inside were equally chaotic with doctors struggling to cope with the numbers of injured, an AFP reporter at the hospital said.
"We were standing in line to get inside the temple when suddenly there was a commotion," said factory worker Ajay, who was brought to hospital unconscious.
"I was pushed onto the ground. Before I could get up people were running over me, stamping over me. I woke up here," he said, pointing to his hospital bed.
Tuesday's stampede is the fourth such incident in India this year.
In August, around 150 Hindu worshippers died in a stampede in the northern state of Himachal Pradesh. That was sparked by rumours of an impending landslide at a hill-top Hindu temple.
Six people died in a similar accident at a popular Hindu festival in July in the eastern state of Orissa, where about one million people had gathered in the town of Puri for an annual celebration.
In March, nine people were killed and many more injured at a religious gathering in central India when a railing broke at the temple premises, leading to a stampede among 100,000 devotees.
In one of India's deadliest ever stampedes, 257 people were killed during a Hindu pilgrimage in western Maharashtra state in January 2005.
Copyright 2008 AFP South Asian Edition
