Chorbagan Durga Puja stampede: Could lessons from the 2015 Desh Priya Park incident have prevented the tragedy?

The Chorbagan Durga Puja pandal stampede, which killed 19 people and injured 25, brought back memories of a similar incident at the Desh Priya Park Puja pandal in South Kolkata on October 18, 2015. However, unlike the Chore Bagan tragedy, the 2015 incident resulted in no fatalities and occurred during the erstwhile Trinamool Congress (TMC) regime.

An 88-foot-tall pandal, designed by artist Mintu Pal, was slated to be the tallest in the city and was constructed using fibreglass. Ahead of the festival, Century Ply and other companies launched a statewide campaign promoting the Durga idol, drawing huge crowds to the venue. On Sashthi, which fell on a Sunday, an estimated one million people visited the pandal at night, triggering a near-stampede situation.

Several people complained of suffocation, and 11 were injured in the chaos and rushed to hospital. The police acted swiftly, cordoning off the area and closing the pandal to visitors. The idol was also covered with a cloth to prevent people outside from viewing it. Roads leading to Desh Priya Park, an arterial road, were closed soon after the incident, and metro stations were shut as well. Traffic was severely disrupted by the near-stampede situation. Although there were no fatalities, members of the Puja committee were pulled up for not factoring in the safety of the visitors and putting proper medical assistance measures in place.

The TMC administration subsequently learnt lessons from the incident. Over the years, it focused on strengthening security, improving traffic management and involving the police and relevant government departments in crowd-control arrangements.

A similar incident occurred in 2021 at Sreebhumi Sporting Club in the Lake Town area. Organised by then minister Sujit Bose, who is now in jail, the pandal was modelled on Dubai's towering Burj Khalifa. The pandal drew lakhs of visitors, resulting in a near-stampede situation, with several people injured. Traffic too was chaotic along VIP Road, which connects the city to the airport. The pandal was subsequently closed to visitors.

"From day one, Mamata Banerjee would hold meetings at Netaji Indoor Stadium to discuss whatever was needed to manage crowds at the pandals. In the Desh Priya Park incident, people were injured, but there were no deaths. This government (BJP) has not done much in terms of crowd management," said Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay, a member of Mamata Banerjee's faction.

The lane leading to the Chorbagan pandal was narrow, and the venue had a single entry and exit point, demarcated by a rope. Sudden rain prompted people outside the pandal to rush in for shelter, while those already inside stayed in to avoid the downpour. Some visitors were trapped amid the chaos at the entrance. The state government is investigating who made the announcement over the public-address system asking people to leave as the pandal was allegedly about to collapse. The announcement is believed to have triggered panic among the crowd.

Seven people have been arrested in connection with the incident, including members of the organising committee. Those arrested include Chorbagan Sarbojanin Durgotsab Samity secretary Raj Kumar and vice-president Santanu Dubey, along with Biplab Mukherjee, who constructed the bamboo structure; Koushik Saha and Pintu Dey, who were responsible for crowd control; and Suman Chakraborty and Rajesh Pal, who oversaw private security. They have been sent to 10 days of police custody.

Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari has said that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) will be headed by a sitting judge of the Calcutta High Court. The government will approach the Chief Justice for the same. According to the Chief Minister, the SIT will have no representative from Kolkata Police to ensure a fair investigation into the lapses that led to the stampede.

The police have faced criticism for allegedly failing to control the Chorbagan situation. The absence of a fire engine at the site has also come under scrutiny, with local residents stepping in to rescue victims and transport the injured to hospital.

For the six-month-old BJP government in the state, there are lessons learnt and stricter precautions to be taken to ensure crowd management at pandals across the state for the remaining days of Durga Puja.