Is crowd management the need of the hour for India?

India was able to avoid a nature induced tragedy but wasn’t able to avoid a man-made tragedy. A stampede at Ratnagarh temple in Datia district, Madhya Pradesh killed 115 people including women and children. This is 27th major stampede incident out of 29 such incident that took place recently at a religious site in India. A rumor about the bridge collapse led to the stampede.

In a very highly populous country like India and that too where people throng to religious sites in huge numbers an effective crowd management system must be in place. The lax response by the authorities is a cause for concern. An effective crowd management could have saved precious lives. In any event small or large planning and organizing is the key for it to become a success without any mishaps. Anticipating huge crowds especially in countries like India and deploying additional crowd managers (in our case it’s always the Police) is the key first step. Inclusion of volunteers (especially locals) in managing crowds and maintaining a proper dress code is needed, so that people can identify them easily and follow their instructions. Putting up proper sign boards is another way of helping the crowd.

In a country like India maintaining queues effectively is a huge task. As per a recent study by the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), forming a snake line and leaving space for people to walk freely and swiftly will help reduce congestion of the crowd. It also stated that all the electric and inflammable material should be marked by sign boards and should be guarded by deploying personnel from miscreant crowd. There should be multiple ways to move in and out of the event arena and raising temporary structures if necessary to reduce crowd congestion. A constant reporting by the authorities about the situation at the venue via loud speakers helps reduce any rumors in the crowd. Medical and fire facilities should be in place in case of any eventuality.

In India lack of proper training in crowd management to the law enforcers is a major drawback in disaster management. Government with the help of NDMA should work in this area of vital need to avoid losing precious lives. A well informed public, well planned administration will give a well organized event. It’s high time that India look at its crowd management system and avoid further loss of life.