Lack of proper planning and poor crowd management were responsible for the stampede at Tirupati, the worst such tragedy to hit the temple town in recent history, leaving six people dead and over 40 injured.
Chaos prevailed when the devotees rushed to secure special darshan tickets for Tirumala Srivari Vaikuntha Dwara on the occasion of Vaikuntha Ekadashi.
Tirupati Municipal Commissioner, Narapureddy Maurya, said that the rushing of thousands of people at once to the counter led to the stampede situation.
The officials of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD), the autonomous temple board, made special arrangements for the issuance of slotted Sarvadarshan tokens at eight centres in Tirupati for the darshan of Lord Venkateswara.
Earlier, it was announced that the tokens would be issued at 5 am on Thursday.
With this, devotees reached the token issuance centres on Wednesday morning for the Vaikuntha Dwara darshan tokens. A large number of devotees flocked to Ramanaidu Government High School in Bairagipatteda, Satyanarayanapuram Zilla Parishad High School, Vishnunivasam, Srinivasam, Indira Maidan, Ramachandra Pushkarani and Emar Palli areas.
Initially, there was a minor scuffle at the Zilla Parishad High School at Jeevakona. Tirupati Superintendent of Police (SP) Subbarayudu went there and brought the situation under control.
Following that, the devotees who had gathered in large numbers at Ramanaidu High School in Bairagipatteda were shifted to the nearby Padmavati Park, a closed area.
What caused the stampede
At 8.15 pm on Wednesday, a person in the park fell ill and the authorities were about to open the gates to provide him with medical treatment. Some devotees, thinking that the gates were opened to let them join the queues, tried to push and move forward. In the melee, many devotees were pushed to the ground. and many fell. Some fell seriously ill due to suffocation.
Five women and one man were among the dead. They have been identified as Buddeti Naidubabu from Narsipatnam, Rajini, Lavanya, Shanti from Visakhapatnam, Nirmala from Bellary in Karnataka and Malliga from Salem in Tamil Nadu.
Due to a massive surge of devotees, the issuance of tokens started eight hours before the previously announced time. The TTD Executive Officer Shyamala Rao said that the decision to issue tokens was taken keeping in view the increased crowd.
In the wake of the stampede, senior officials have tightened security at the token issuance centres and additional forces have been deployed.
The 10-day Vaikunta Dwara Darshanam (darshan of the deity from the northern entrance of the temple) commences from January 10.
“The death of several devotees in a stampede near Vishnu Niwasam in Tirupati for tokens to visit Tirumala Srivari Vaikuntha Dwara has shocked me. This tragic incident, which took place at a time when devotees had gathered in large numbers for tokens, deeply disturbed me,” the Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu wrote in a post on X.
Later, he visited the spot and reviewed the situation with the officials. “A DSP opened the gates…and immediately everybody pushing ahead led to this stampede and reports are emerging that six persons died,” a TTD official was quoted as saying by a local news channel.
According to officials, the TTD made arrangements for the distribution of 1.20 lakh tokens to the devotees for the “sarva darshan” (free darshan) of Lord Venkateshwara Swamy for the first three days of the annual darshan on January 10 to 12.
The distribution arrangements were made at 94 counters at three pilgrim lodges.
A TTD official said the pilgrims began thronging the lodges from Wednesday evening itself. Chaos broke out at Srinivasam to get the tokens for the annual pilgrimage. “This resulted in a stampede-like situation, as the pilgrims surged forward towards the counters to get the tokens,” the official added, requesting anonymity.
TTD executive officer J Shyamal Rao inspected the incident site and oversaw the rescue operations with the help of vigilance and police forces.
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