After the historic victory of RCB (Royal Challengers Bangalore), the atmosphere of enthusiasm and celebrations on Wednesday outside the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore turned into a sudden pain and mourning. Amidst the huge crowd, 11 people died in a stampede and dozens were injured. This accident happened when the entire team of Virat Kohli and RCB reached the stadium with their first IPL Trophy.
The event was kept ticket-free, due to which thousands of people reached the stadium. Adequate police forces and security personnel were not deployed to control the crowd. The crowd became uncontrollable without any controlled entry system and there was a stampede in this chaos.
The team reached Bangalore around 1 pm. The first plan was that the players would parade in the city in the open bus, but the police did not allow it in view of the huge crowd. Despite this, thousands of crowds were already gathered in the roads through which the team passed. Virat Kohli was sitting at the forefront of the bus with the trophy.
Virat Kohli’s wife and actress Anushka Sharma also shared videos of this parade and celebration in the story, in which thousands of fans were seen swinging to welcome her team.
As soon as the team reached the Chinnaswamy Stadium around 5 pm, the level of the crowd increased further. There was no concrete plan to handle the crowd. The news of those who died in the accident started coming out around 6 pm, but despite this, the celebrations continued in the stadium.
BCCI Secretary Devjit Saikia expressed deep grief over the incident. He told PTI, “This is a negative aspect of popularity. The organizers should have managed it better. I have deep condolences to the families of those killed.” He further said that “When someone celebrates such a big victory, there should be strong security arrangements. This time there has been a lapse somewhere.”
Giving an example, Saikia said that in Kolkata last year, KKR celebrated in a similar way after the victory, but there was no such untoward such untoward. He reiterated that there is a need to take lessons from this accident and to organize such events in future with more responsibility.
This incident has raised questions on the organizers, local administration and IPL management. Was it right to call the crowd only on the basis of enthusiasm? Should the organizers not have made a plan in terms of security? Now answers to all these questions are being searched.
