The fatal line between fervour and frenzy Premium

Stampede at Tirupati leaves six dead, sparking chaos and questions about crowd management.

C.B. Gopal Reddy, a nonagenarian, was taking a nap in his flat at Bairagipatteda, a residential area in Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, when his house help, Revathi, jolted him awake around 8.30 p.m. on January 8.

Even as Revathi began explaining to him about a commotion at Padmavati Park in their locality, he heard the unsettling sound of the ambulances entering the area and reaching the park where nearly 2,000 devotees of Lord Venkateswara have been anxiously waiting since morning.

The devotees, who came from various parts of India, gathered at the park as they waited for officials to allow them into the Rama Naidu Municipal Corporation School. There, they were to be issued the Vaikunta Ekadasi darshan tokens for Tirumala temple, the largest Hindu temple in the world.

The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) announced that 1.2 lakh darshan tokens would be issued for three days from January 10 to 12. The tokens were to be issued from 5 a.m. on January 9. However, scores of devotees began turning up in the temple city a day in advance, on January 8.

Rama Naidu Municipal Corporation School was one of the eight token centres that the TTD, the administrative body of the temple, chose for the annual event.

Mr. Gopal Reddy, however, was surprised to see hundreds of devotees turn up at his locality, which is not known to many non-locals. He assumed that the token centre was set up to cater to the locals of the temple city.

Little did he or his neighbours know that the devotees were ferried to the area by autorickshaws. The devotees say that they were told by the auto drivers that they were more likely to get the tokens at this centre as it was unknown to many and that the rush was less there.