Latest news with #NikhilNaz
India Today
3 days ago
- Sport
- India Today
Killer factors behind the avoidable Bengaluru stampede. Explained in 5 points
Tens of thousands, if not lakhs, gathered within a kilometre radius of Bengaluru's M Chinnaswamy Stadium to celebrate the Royal Challengers Bengaluru's first-ever IPL title. Hours later, the joyous frenzy turned tragic, with 11 lives lost in a stampede that hours before the chaos unfolded into a stampede, there were already signs -- visible, recognisable, avoidable and actionable -- that were 50 people have been left injured in the melee. A day later, it's the usual blame game and politics that has started around the tragedy in a country that has seen stampedes at regular intervals. Like in the case of the stampede at the New Delhi Railway Station in February, in which five red flags were missed, the RCB victory celebration too presented some warning or even acknowledging these might have averted the tragedy that followed.1. RCB'S VICTORY PARADE TWEETTo start with, the RCB's social media posts fuelled anticipation of a grand victory 3:14 pm on Wednesday, RCB's official X account announced, "RCB Victory Parade. Today at 5 pm IST. Victory Parade will be followed by celebrations at the Chinnaswamy stadium," it posted, urging fans to follow police post, promoting an open-top bus parade from Vidhana Soudha to the stadium, drew massive crowds despite the Bengaluru traffic police's earlier announcement at 11:56 am that no parade was planned due to security concerns, according to a report in The Indian conflicting messages created confusion, with fans converging in large numbers, many unaware the parade was cancelled. The RCB's promotion of the event, despite police directives, fuelled the crowd surge, turning the mass gathering into a nightmare.2. FREE PASSES, LIMITED ENTRYThe RCB, in the X post at 3:14, also announced limited free passes for the stadium event, available online, which led to a rush for access."Free passes (limited entry) available on (dot) royalchallengers (dot)com," the RCB added in the passes were issued, but the authorities later declared free entry for all. What followed was a massive crowd surging toward the gates of the both with and without passes, attempted to enter, overwhelming the limited entry Nikhil Naz, consulting editor of Sports Today, India Today Digital's sister portal, described young fans, including girls and teenage boys, being trampled in the melee due to inadequate security at the promise of free entry, without robust crowd management, created a bottleneck that turned fatal.3. COPS INSISTED ON SUNDAY BUT STATE GOVT DIDN'T RELENTadvertisementDespite Bengaluru Police advising the Karnataka government to hold the RCB celebration on a Sunday to avoid traffic and allow better security preparation, the event was rushed through within 24 hours of the IPL were exhausted from overnight crowd control during the celebrations after the victory on Tuesday night and must have had little time to plan and Bengaluru Police officers said their warning against holding the RCB celebrations at short notice, and their call for a week's delay, were overlooked, the Deccan Herald reported early on warnings, the government allegedly pushed ahead, leading to chaos, understaffing, poor barricading, and a deadly stampede that claimed 11 leaders of the state must have wanted to cash in on the peak celebratory mood. Karnataka Deputy CM DK Shivakumar claimed that 5,000 police personnel were deployed for the RCB celebration, calling the crowd "uncontrollable." However, this was later contradicted by the state's Advocate General, Shashi Kiran Shetty, who admitted in court that just over 1,000 personnel had actually been Bengaluru police chief Bhaskar Rao criticised the "unplanned, hurried, disorganised celebrations", saying "As former city top cop, I would have told the CM to postpone the victory march and felicitations. Yesterday [Tuesday] night's crowd frenzy was enough warning to allow emotions to calm down".advertisement4. STADIUM CAPACITY OF 35,000 BUT CROWD OF 2-3 LAKHThe Chinnaswamy Stadium's capacity is approximately 35,000, but 2-3 lakh fans gathered, with 1 lakh near Vidhana Soudha alone, where the celebrations had initially CM Siddaramaiah admitted, "We did not anticipate this kind of crowd", which reveals that the event was organised hastily after the Tuesday night overwhelming turnout of fans, far exceeding expectations, exposed poor planning by the Karnataka State Cricket Association (KSCA) and RCB. The mismatch between the venue's capacity and the crowd size created the dangerous pressure-cooker situation. 5. EXIT GATES AT CHINNASWAMY: A CRUCIAL FACTORThe stampede occurred primarily at three gates (Gates 3, 12, and 18), where fans pushed to enter or climb barriers. The narrow passageways and a collapsed temporary slab over a drain near the stadium triggered panic, leading to asphyxia-related Divyanshi, who had travelled from Andhra Pradesh to Bengaluru just to catch a glimpse of her favourite Virat Kohli, died of suffocation and a head injury near one of the entrance eyewitness told news agency PTI that chaos erupted when a crowd of nearly 600 to 700 people, mostly women, forced open a gate and tried to rush in at once."Information was spread that the team's roadshow had been cancelled and called on everyone to gather at the stadium, and many women had come without any tickets... The police tried to stop the women, but they did not listen and tried to climb the gates. Around 600-700 broke open the gates and at a time tried to enter. This led to a stampede. Many victims were women. Although I tried to help, I couldn't because of the crowd and chaos," the unnamed eyewitness told confirmed that all the victims died due to asphyxia, a condition caused by a lack of oxygen, which leads to unconsciousness and, ultimately, death, reported The Advocate General Shashi Kiran Shetty told the High Court that all 21 gates were open, the counsel for the petitioner said, "Only three gates of the stadium were opened, without there being capacity to accommodate so many people", according to a report in Live Karnataka High Court was informed by the Advocate General that all 11 deaths and the injuries to 66 people occurred at just three gates, indicating poor crowd management at entry and exit conclusion, the Bengaluru stampede was a tragedy born of a combination of miscommunication, inadequate planning, and underestimation of fan turnout. The RCB's premature social media announcements, poorly managed entry rules, insufficient police preparedness, a massive crowd overwhelming the stadium's capacity, and inadequate gate management created the storm. The Karnataka government has ordered a magisterial enquiry, and both the RCB and the KSCA have announced financial aid for victims' families. But if lessons aren't learnt, such tragedies will Watch
India Today
4 days ago
- General
- India Today
Celebration turns into chaos: How Bengaluru stampede unfolded during RCB's IPL bash
What began as a city-wide celebration for Royal Challengers Bengaluru's historic Indian Premier League title win turned tragic on Wednesday, June 4, after a stampede near the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium left 11 people dead and over 40 had announced celebrations with fans in Bengaluru on Wednesday, a day after they defeated Punjab Kings in the IPL 2025 final to end the 18-year-wait for local authorities had denied permission for an open-top bus parade that was scheduled to run from the Vidhana Soudha to the Bengaluru stadium-a distance of just one kilometre. However, over two lakh fans thronged the area to catch a glimpse of the RCB team, returning home with the trophy after their 18-year-long wait. RCB had announced a celebratory event in the evening with the fans. While entry to the stadium was permitted only through passes, fans without access gathered in massive numbers around the premises. According to preliminary information shared with the government, a temporary slab placed over a drain near the stadium premises collapsed under the weight of those standing on it. The collapse reportedly caused panic, leading to a is the account of Nikhil Naz, Consulting Editor – Sports, who was at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium along with cameraman Deepak, describing how the stampede stampede happened outside Cubbon Park Metro Station. It occurred as a huge crowd of youth, mostly males, blocked a road to dance. People who were trying to move to either side of the road could not move because the road was blocked by this boisterous crowd. That's when people started pushing into the crowd, trying to move either to the left or the right side of the the melee, young people-mostly girls and some teenage boys-got trampled upon. There were no security personnel in this area. Security had restricted themselves to only the people who got trampled fainted and were brought inside the stadium to be taken to hospital in the ambulances that were deployed inside. Some were taken to hospital by ambulance. But because there were only two ambulances inside, some weren't lucky enough to get who didn't get an ambulance were carried in the arms by security personnel. These security people ran towards the main road to find cars to take these unconscious people to the nearby hospital. Because the roads immediately outside the stadium were blocked by crowds, unconscious people had to be carried for 500 metres to reach a point where regular traffic was got caught in the crowd because we were heading to Gate 13, our entry point. When we started going towards the gate, there were three different forces: one going in one direction (Cubbon Park to Gate 13), another going in the opposite direction (from Gate 13 towards Gates 1 and 2), and a third force of people who were standing in the middle of the road, screaming and one stage, we lost control of our movement and naturally got pushed around, eventually reaching outside the whirlpool of the crowd. But because me and Deepak (my cameraman) are full-grown men, we could survive the push of the crowd. Women and young male fans, however, would have easily succumbed to the force of the crowd and got trampled a statement, RCB said it amended the fan interaction event immediately upon learning of the incident. "The safety and well-being of everyone is of utmost importance to us," the statement secretary Devajit Saikia acknowledged there were lapses in the organisation of the event, but clarified that the cricket board had no role in it. IPL chairman Arun Dhumal said the board was not even informed about who was behind the RCB team was earlier felicitated by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah at the Vidhana Soudha. Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar had received the players at the airport earlier in the day before joining them for the event in the evening. You May Also Like IN THIS STORY#IPL 2025
