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Stampede In Pakistan Kills 36
ISLAMABAD, April 1 (IslamOnline & News agencies) - In a tragic stampede in Pakistan, 36 pilgrims died and 100 were injured at a 13th century Islamic shrine in central Pakistan, officials said Sunday.
The toll rose from a previously reported 27 to the present 36, as four more victims died in remote villages Sunday, a senior police official said.
"We have received reports that four more injured pilgrims died in remote villages," police officer Anwar Virk said.
Twenty people, all men, were crushed to death at the scene at around midnight Saturday.
"Five seriously injured people were removed by relatives for treatment in their villages but all of them died this afternoon," local commissioner Najibullah Malik said.
All of them were suffering from "rib compression," he said adding that the village clinics were not equipped to provide treatment for such injuries.
"We are now thoroughly checking private clinics also for any casualties," he said.
President Mohammad Rafiq Tarar and military ruler General Pervez Musharraf in separate sympathy statements expressed "deep grief and sorrow over the tragic loss of lives."
Police said the victims were among thousands of men crammed into a narrow street leading to the main door of the shrine of Baba Farib Shakar Gunj in Paktattan, 180 kilometers south of Lahore.
Javed said the stampede, one of the worst in the country, took place as caretakers delayed the opening of the shrine's Behashti Darwaza (Paradise Door) by more than three hours.
Around 100,000 people were waiting in long queues outside the gate when hundreds of others made a dash through a narrow lane meant for shrine officials, he said.
At least 20 people were overrun by the crowd and crushed to death, officials said, adding that around 100 were hospitalized overnight.
"We had only 27 bodies," doctor Samina Murad of the Civil Hospital Pakpattan said, adding that almost all the injured had been released after treatment.
"Most of the deaths occurred due to suffocation," another doctor Abdul Ghaffar said and that "only five people remain in hospital."
An official statement said "people became restless" amid the delay and some of them decided to seek entry through the northern side of the shrine, which was out-of-bounds.
"Soon after the commencement of the ceremony, people at the northern gate scrambled to pass through the gate. Consequently many people got trampled," it said, adding that a judicial inquiry had been ordered to clarify the cause of the deadly stamped.
It said the inquiry would "fix the responsibilities on the public functionaries as well as members of the public responsible for the tragic episode."
Deputy Inspector of Police Shaukat Javed said the crowd rushed forward as the Behashti Door was about to be opened, adds AFP. He said many of the victims, including a 12-year old boy, died of suffocation as they were crushed against a wall.
A shrine spokesman denounced the local administration as negligent.
Abdul Zahir told a Pakistan daily, The News, that the tragedy could have been avoided had the administration taken adequate measures to control the crowd.
In his turn, the town's police chief, Virk, denied any security mistake and blamed the incident on the caretaker, Deevan Azmat.
Virk said Azmat had been busy in "negotiating an increase in the annual stipend" given by the religious ministry for the maintenance of the shrine.
"This delayed his arrival and made the crowd restive," he added.
The victims included people from different parts of the country. Local authorities were preparing to transport bodies to their respective hometowns, officials said.
Many followers believe that they will be guaranteed a place in heaven if they pass through the shrine's door, opened once a year at midnight for 24 hours during the first week of the Islamic month of Muharram.
Every year around 500,000 people attend religious rituals marking the anniversary of the death of the Muslim saint Baba Farid Ganj Shakar, who died in 1265.
The saint is highly respected among Pakistan's both 77% majority Sunni and 20% Shiite Muslim populations.
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