The annual Jagannath Rath Yatra in Odisha's Puri saw a tragic incident on Sunday after a stampede-like situation erupted during the pulling of Lord Balabhadra's Taladhwaja chariot, with one devotee dead and several others injured.
The chaos erupted as thousands of devotees converged to pull up the huge wooden chariot along the Grand Road (Badadanda) and people rushed to the scene, as officials said during the rush, and some people got stuck in the crowd in a stampede situation. The injured people were ferried immediately to Puri District Headquarters Hospital, where doctors found one male devotee dead. Hospital sources said the victim died of suffocation.
The incident briefly cast a shadow over one of India’s largest and most revered religious festivals, which attracts lakhs of devotees from all over the country and abroad every year.
Earlier in the day, the ceremonial procession had started with elaborate rituals at the 12th-century Jagannath Temple. The three sibling deities– Lord Jagannath, Lord Balabhadra and Goddess Subhadra– were taken out of the sanctuary in the traditional Pahandi procession and deposited on their respective chariots after centuries-old rituals.
The chariot-pulling ceremony was officially initiated at 5.20 pm after Puri Shankaracharya Swami Nischalananda Saraswati visited the three chariots and Gajapati Maharaja Dibyasingha Deb, the titular king of Puri, completed the sacred Chhera Pahanra ritual by ceremonially sweeping the chariots.
President Droupadi Murmu, Odisha Governor Raghubar Das, Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and Leader of Opposition Naveen Patnaik also participated in the festivities. The President performed a parikrama around the three chariots before the symbolic pulling of Lord Jagannath's chariot.
Despite the unfortunate incident, the procession continued under heavy security arrangements. Security personnel had deployed nearly 180 platoons, supported by AI-powered CCTV surveillance, drone monitoring, medical personnel and emergency response units to manage the huge gathering of over 1 million people.
Fire and emergency services deployed 46 fire tenders along Puri, and water sprinklers were used to cool them down in the hot and humid weather. The organizers also kept an eye on crowds throughout the event.
This year’s Rath Yatra is especially significant because it is observed as a two-day festival after 53 years due to different celestial alignments. So many rituals, such as Nabajouban Darshan and Netra Utsav, are being performed on the same day before the grand procession.
The tragic death has brought back to me a lot of how difficult it is to manage crowds at large religious events. But there will be an investigation going on and rescue teams will be there to help devotees and make sure the rest of the festival goes smoothly.
