Deaths feared in stampede at Maha Kumbh festival in northern India

Several people were feared dead and many more injured in a stampede early Wednesday as tens of thousands of Hindus rushed to take a holy bath in the river at the massive Maha Kumbh festival in northern India's Prayagraj city, local media reported.

Distressed families lined up outside a makeshift hospital inquiring about their missing relatives, while rescuers helped the injured and police tried to manage the crowds.

People's belongings like clothes, blankets and backpacks were strewn around the scene of the stampede. It was not immediately clear what triggered the panic or how many people had been hurt. Some local news websites said 10 people had died.

Wednesday was a sacred day during the six-week festival, and authorities were expecting many millions of devotees to engage in a ritual bath at the confluence of the Ganges, the Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati rivers. The ritualistic bathing's main draw are thousands of ash-smeared Hindu ascetics who arrive in massive processions toward the confluence to take a holy dip in the waters.

Yogi Adityanath, chief minister of the Uttar Pradesh state, urged people to not head toward the confluence and instead take baths at other riverbanks. Adityanath did not make any reference to the stampede but warned people not to "pay attention to any rumours."

The Maha Kumbh festival, held every 12 years, started on Jan. 13 and is the world's largest religious gathering. Authorities expect more than 400 million people to throng the pilgrimage site in total over the next six weeks.

Authorities have built a sprawling tent city on the riverbanks to accommodate visitors. It has 3,000 kitchens and 150,000 toilets, plus roads, electricity and water, communication towers and 11 hospitals.

About 50,000 security personnel are stationed in the city to maintain law and order and manage crowds. Authorities also installed more than 2,500 cameras, some powered by AI, to send crowd movement and density information to four central control rooms, where officials can quickly deploy personnel to avoid stampedes.

In 2013, at least 40 pilgrims who were taking part in the festival were killed in a stampede at a train station in Prayagraj.

Deadly stampedes are relatively common around Indian religious festivals, where large crowds gather in small areas with shoddy infrastructure and few safety measures. In July at least 116 people died, most of them women and children, when thousands at a religious gathering in northern India stampeded at a tent in Hathras town.