Big accident in Banke Bihari temple, two devotees died due to crowd pressure during Mangala Aarti

A major accident took place due to the pressure of a huge crowd during Mangala Aarti to be held at the world-famous Thakur Banke Bihari temple on Shri Krishna Janmashtami. In the accident caused by the crowd, 2 devotees died while 6 were reported injured. The injured have been admitted to the hospital. The top officials of the district were also present on the temple premises at the time of the accident.

On Shri Krishna Janmashtami, Mangala Aarti is performed in the Banke Bihari temple at 1.55 am. This event is held only once a year. Thousands of devotees reached the temple premises on Friday night to see Mangala Aarti. The pressure of the crowd increased as the temple had many times more people than the capacity of the devotees.

During this, two devotees died due to the pressure of the crowd at gates number one and four of the temple. In the accident, Nirmala Devi wife of Dev Prakash, resident of Noida Sector 99, and Ram Prasad Vishwakarma (65), resident of Rukmani Bihar Colony, and native of Jabalpur, died in the accident. The relatives did not conduct the post-mortem of the dead bodies. The relatives went home with the dead bodies on Saturday morning.

A heavy police force including DM, SSP, and Municipal Commissioner was present at the time when the accident took place in the temple. Soon after the accident, police and private security personnel started evacuating the fainting devotees from the temple. The devotees who were injured in this accident were sent to Rama Krishna Mission, Braj Health Care, and Sau Shaiya Hospital in Vrindavan. Due to the pressure of the crowd in the Banke Bihari temple, accidents have happened in the past. A female devotee had died during Holi. Earlier in February 2022, the death of a devotee resident of Ghaziabad also took place under pressure from the crowd. Even after these accidents, the administration did not take a lesson. Crowd control arrangements failed on Janmashtami.