New Delhi – A massive fire swept through a temple in the southern Indian state of Kerala Sunday, killing more than 100 people and injuring at least 280 after thousands gathered to watch a fireworks display.
It was the latest in a grim series of fires and stampedes at temples and during religious festivals, where huge crowds routinely gather.
Here is a list of some of the worst such disasters in India in recent years:
2008
August 3: About 150 Hindu worshippers are killed in a temple stampede sparked by rumours of a landslide in northern Himachal Pradesh state.
September 30: Some 224 pilgrims die in a stampede when worshippers rush to reach a hilltop temple in the northern city of Jodhpur.
2010
March 4: Sixty-three people, mostly women and children, are killed in a stampede at a temple where free clothes are being doled out in northern Uttar Pradesh state.
2011
January 14: Some 102 Hindu devotees are killed in a stampede which breaks out when thousands of pilgrims make their way home after an annual pilgrimage in Kerala state.
November 8: Sixteen people including 14 women die in a stampede at a religious ceremony near the holy Hindu city of Haridwar.
Reuters
2012
November 19: Eighteen women and children are crushed to death in a stampede when a rope bridge collapses at a Hindu festival in eastern Bihar state.
2013
February 10: At least 36 people are trampled to death as pilgrims head home from the Kumbh Mela religious festival on the banks of the River Ganges.
October 13: A stampede near a temple kills at least 115 people in Madhya Pradesh state, where up to 400,000 devotees were gathered. Twenty-one people, including all 17 police from a local station, are suspended after the tragedy.
Ratangarh town where the disaster occurred was the scene of a similar stampede seven years earlier, when 50 people were crushed to death.
2014
January 18: At least 18 people die and more than 40 are injured in a stampede in Mumbai when a large crowd gathered to pay their last respects to a Muslim spiritual leader.
October 3: Some 32 people are killed in a stampede at a popular Hindu festival in eastern India after panic erupts following rumours of an electrical fire.
2015
July 14: A stampede on the banks of a holy river crushes 27 pilgrims to death and injures dozens in southern India.
2016
April 10: A huge fire sweeps through a temple in southern India, killing more than 100 people.
AFP
