At least 18 people, mostly women and children, died and 15 were injured in a stampede at New Delhi’s main railway station, the chief minister of India’s capital territory told reporters early on Sunday. Most of the deaths were caused by stampedes at religious festivals or gatherings, most of them in the past 20 years. A total of 250 people were trampled to death at the Chamundagar temple in the northern desert state of Rajasthan as pilgrims gathered to celebrate Navratri in 2008. Around 115 were killed and more than a hundred injured after a stampeded at the Ratangarh temple in Madhya Pradesh in October 2013. Around 121 people died after thousands of devotees rushed to get a closer glimpse of a Hindu preacher in the Hathras district of Uttar Pradesh state in July 2024. At least 12 died and more were injured at the Vaishno Devi shrine in Jammu and Kashmir in January 2022 after a huge crowd of devotee tried to enter the narrow shrine. Of the dead, 27 were women, including an eight-year-old girl. Around 145 Hindu pilgrims died after rumours of a landslide triggered a stampeding at the mountaintop Naina Devi temple in Himachal Pradesh in August 2008. More than 265 Hindu devotees died and hundreds more injured after an incident at the Mandhardevi temple in Wai town in the western state of Maharashtra in January 2005.
