MUMBAI, Jan 25: As many as 300 Hindus, including women and children, were crushed or burned to death in a stampede and subsequent fire near a temple in western India on Tuesday, the district's top official said.
Officials said a short-circuit may have sparked a fire in roadside stalls when nearly 300,000 people were on an annual pilgrimage to the popular Mandher Devi temple, on a hilltop near Wai, about 260kms south east of Mumbai.
Scores were crushed to death on the steep and narrow hill path leading to the temple and many others were charred, witnesses and officials said. Reporters saw at least 100 bodies at the site.
"About 300 people are dead," Sharad Jadhav, resident deputy collector for Satara district where the temple is located, told newsmen by phone. He said police had evacuated most of the injured to nearby hospitals using commuter buses and trucks.
"We do not have a precise number of people injured but several dozens have been taken to hospitals." Dishevelled and mangled bodies were lined up as tin-roofed stalls smouldered near the temple and adjoining settlement.
"There were more than a hundred dead bodies lying around and dozens of others have already been sent down to Wai by bus," an Asian News International television reporter said. -Reuters
