New Delhi: Despite the gruesomeness of the stampede that took place at the New Delhi Railway Station on February 15, the station is still being frequented by people who wish to board a train to Prayagraj, where the Maha Kumbh Mela is taking place.
Victims of the stampede at the New Delhi Railway Station were rushed into the Lok Nayak Jai Prakash hospital late on February 15. “They brought in two people in the night at around 10-11 pm. One had a crushed nose bleeding profusely and the other was badly bruised,” assisting staff at the hospital told The Wire. The man’s voice is hushed.
Outside the hospital are security forces and the Delhi Police who have been barring camerapersons from going inside. Inside, doctors and administrators are quiet.
Dr. Satyajeet was the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) at LNJP who accepted that the victims were brought in an injured condition but refused to share any further details about their current status.
LNJP Hospital. Photo: Tarushi Aswani.
Mere metres away from the sight of the stampede, LNJP had attracted a lot of media professionals who were waiting for an official statement from the hospital. Outside the hospital, this reporter saw men who claimed that they were waiting to offer assistance to those admitted due to the stampede. Two of them said they were from the Bajrang Dal and added that the Bharatiya Janata Party was facilitating them in getting assistance for those in need. “We are here for them as they were on their way to a great Hindu pilgrimage. Their injuries are unfortunate,” said one of them, Dev Kumar.
Another Bajrang Dal member present there said that this unfortunate stampede was “a conspiracy against those travelling to attend the Maha Kumbh pilgrimage and must be investigated like a crime”. A little later, on the insistence of Dev Kumar, he retracted this line of thinking and requested anonymity.
Outside LNJP, the daughter of an injured pilgrim alleged that the hospital was not taking her father’s injuries into account. Speaking to several reporters present at the scene, the woman said that her father was being refused treatment despite having been injured at NDLS.
The daughter of an injured pilgrim alleges that the LNJP officials did not take her father’s injuries into account. Photo: Tarushi Aswani/The Wire.
Many who were injured in the stampede were also taken to other hospitals such as Ram Manohar Lohiya Hospital and Lady Hardinge Medical College.
Kilometres away from NDLS, at the Lady Hardinge Medical College, staff told The Wire that two of the victims were declared dead on arrival. As of 4 pm, February 16, both the dead bodies were in the hospital’s mortuary.
Police presence is mounting at all three hospitals treating the injured. This stampede that killed at least 18 people when the crowd in the station had gone out of control also poses multiple questions at the government at the Centre and now even in Delhi about crowd management, mismanagement and preventing future stampedes.
At the site of the stampede, crowds persisted. A Delhi Police official who was posted at the site told this reporter that at least 400 Delhi Police and Railway Police Force personnel were posted there after the stampede. Several officers were also repeatedly patrolling the platforms and shooing away people sitting on the platform.
Police at the NDLS. Photo: Tarushi Aswani/The Wire
At NDLS, after the stampede, the Ministry of Railways had set up a first aid desk for the injured and victims. The medical staff at the desk however claimed that the injuries were such that the desk saw no victims asking for help – they were rushed to the hospitals straightaway. Kishan Pal, a medical officer at the desk said that victims from the stampede did not get a chance to arrive at the desk. “Crowds should be managed better. I have served at the Prayagraj Railway Station as well, and know that these mishaps are beyond first aid. But the government is setting up such desks everywhere to aid pilgrims,” he said.
The help desk at the NDLS. Photo: Tarushi Aswani/The Wire
Outside NDLS, a swarm of porters await work. One of them who claims to have witnessed the stampede said, “It doesn’t only have to be travellers who can get crushed in the stampede. It could be relatives who come to drop them off at the station, it could be us. We could have died. There was simply no arrangement do deal with such heavy crowds,” he said.
“The rush is such that people are hopping onto trains that go to Prayagraj like they hop onto local buses. People with just a single backpack are hopping onto Kumbh trains,” another porter told The Wire.
Despite the stampedes, several pilgrims were still seen buying train tickets and heading to platforms with trains to Prayagraj from NDLS. Travellers at the railway station pointed out that it is as if no stampede ever took place.
