Maharashtra has a plan to stall stampedes in places of worship

Stampedes do not evoke the same sense of fear or loathing as a terror strike. But if a body count is taken, just temple stampedes would account for more deaths. The 2008 stampedes in the Naina Devi temple in Himachal Pradesh, and the Chamunda Devi temple in Jodhpur, and the 2010 stampede in the Janki temple in Pratapgarh, where hundreds were killed, are still fresh in memory. Closer home, the 2005 Mandhara Devi temple stampede near Wai in Satara was shocking because of its proximity.

But now, the state government is working on a plan to minimise the risk of stampedes occurring in temples, at least in Maharashtra. As per this plan, temples across the state will be graded on the basis of safety risks to devotees caused by heavy festival-day crowds. The state law and judiciary department is working to classify all shrines registered with the charity commissioner by October end so that they can come up with crowd control and security measures at these places.

An official in the law and judiciary department said: “We started work on this plan last month. The aim is to create a disaster management plan for every temple according to the magnitude of crowds visiting the shrines. We will grade temples according to the number of devotees. If we have such data, it will be easy to give suggestions on crowd management techniques to the district collector. From next year, every temple will get its own disaster management plan.” Around 53,000 temple trusts are registered with the charity commissioner and the district administration. All temples will be covered by the classification.

Gradation will be done on the basis of the number of devotees visiting a temple in a year or during festival days or jatras (processions). Grading will also be according to a temple’s financial resources.

Unplanned overcrowding at temples leads to accidents, killing hundreds of people. The Satara stampede killed 291 people. The tragedy took place during the annual jatra, when lakhs of people gathered at the shrine. The narrow and sloping path leading to the temple had become slippery due to the breaking of coconuts and spilling of oil used for the deepstambha (lamp pillar). An explosion of LPG cylinders triggered the stampede. After this incident, the local administration placed a ban on lighting oil lamps, breaking coconuts and animal sacrifice at temples.

After the gradation of temples, the concerned district administration will implement a crowd management plan, which includes creation of a separate parking facility for vehicles near the temple and putting a railing along the steps.

The authorities are also looking at problems like water shortage at the shrines. According to district administration officials, most temple trusts take water from dams and other government water sources, but do not pay for this. The Shirdi Sai Baba temple and the Siddhivinayak temple are among the few temples directly controlled by the government. Others are run by trusts.

The most visited temples and shrines in the state include Shri Swami Samarth Math at Akkalkot, Saptashrungi Devi at Wani, Khandoba temple at Jejuri, Bharadidevi at Malvan, Gajanan Maharaj at Shegaon, Ganesh temple at Ganpatipule and Mahalaxmi and Babulnath in Mumbai. Though Siddhivinayak also sees a heavy rush of pilgrims, the numbers are distributed throughout the year. At the other shrines, an annual festival can bring a sudden rush of pilgrims, which becomes unmanageable.