Hathras stampede FIR blames rush for ‘dhul’ of Baba
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Hathras stampede FIR accuses organiser of destroying evidences
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, July 3: The police FIR has claimed that the rush to get ‘dhul (soil)’ touched by the cavalcade of the Baba, Narayan Sakar Hari, caused the stampede in Hathras. The police FIR has not named the spiritual guru.
The police FIR has claimed that there was a strong crowd of about 2.5 lakh for the ‘satsang (religious congregation)’. The police FIR stated that the permission was given to the organisers for a crowd of 80,000.
The police accused the organisers of not extending any help when the crowd went out of control. It also stated that the security personnel of the spiritual guru with sticks stopped the faithful from reaching for the soil.
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“At about 2 PM, when Suraj Pal aka Bhole Baba got into his vehicle to leave the venue after finishing his pravachan (sermons), the crowd pushed to collect the soil. With lakhs of people rushing, those who were collecting the soil began getting crushed,” added the police FIR.
It stated that the crowd pressure kept mounting, which left the people unconscious and also dead at the spot. “The police and the local administration tried all efforts to provide help to the people,” added the police FIR.
The police FIR also accused that the organisers indulged in the destruction of the evidences. “The organisers dumped the cloths and the belongings of the unconscious and dead people at a nearby farm field in attempts to destroy the evidences,” added the police FIR.
The police made the organiser Devprakash Madhukar as the main accused. The spiritual guru is not made an accused in the FIR.
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Neeraj Mourya, the Samajwadi Party MP, told PTI that the administration “just gave permission to the organizer without making any arrangements. There should have been at least 20 ambulances.”
Meanwhile, a public interest litigation (PIL) has been filed in the Supreme Court for a probe by a retired judge of the apex court. The PIL also sought a direction to the Uttar Pradesh government for a status report.
Live Law quoted from the PIL, which said that “such incident prima facie depicts the serious condition of responsibility lapse, negligence and unfaithful duty of care towards to the public by the government authorities”. The PIL also mentioned various incidents in the past which “took place in our country wherein due to the mismanagement, lapse in duty, negligent maintenance activities, there has been cases of huge public casualties which could have been avoided yet due to such arbitrary and undone actions have led to such work”.
The police have said that 121 people, mostly women, died in the stampede yesterday.
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