In two months, we have witnessed two major stampedes at religious centres. The latest stampede in a Rajasthan temple exposed the poor disaster preparedness. Government should awaken to the need to put in place a disaster management plan.

The Chamunda Devi temple tragedy is the fourth stampede of the year. A stampede at the Naina Devi temple in Himachal Pradesh on August 3, sparked by rumours of an impending landslide, killed 162 people. Similarly, six people died in a stampede at the world-famous Jagannath Rath Yatra on July 4 in the holy city of Puri, where about a million people had gathered for the annual celebration. In the worst incident ever, at the Mandradevi shrine in Maharashtra in 2005, a fire broke out during a religious ceremony and in the resultant stampede 258 people perished.


Lack of facilities to control huge gatherings at religious places leads to stampedes. During religious festivals or special occasions, Indian temples are packed with huge unruly crowds. Many a time, this has led to unprecedented disasters triggering a huge reaction in general. However we forget to draw a lesson every time disaster strikes. There are no preventive measures and preparedness guidelines for temples in India. Every big temple has a management board but it lacks a strategy to deal with such a crisis. Moreover, the role of the public in general is crucial to prevent such tragedies. Religious organisations, NGOs and the government departments concerned must work together to sensitise the public to general safety measures.

The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), the apex body for disaster management in India, has suggested an approach to disaster management which is comprised of six elements, viz, prevention, mitigation and preparedness in the pre-disaster phase and response, rehabilitation and reconstruction in the post-disaster phase. It also places emphasis on community empowerment through institutional capacity development, strengthened public awareness and community resilience by mainstreaming disaster management in India. Thus disaster management in temples largely depends on community participation. Moreover, preparedness is the basic action plan towards risk minimisation. Every religious institution should have a disaster preparedness cell to educate the devotees about this vulnerability. Keeping in view the increasing incidents of stampede lately, the government should chalk out a comprehensive disaster preparedness plan for religious gatherings. The community must take it upon itself to prevent recurrence of such unfortunate incidents in future.