The stampede that claimed 18 lives was caused by the usual suspect: overcrowding—a chronic Indian Railways problem. The government’s solution is to continually increase the number of trains—a cure that makes everything worse.
Tell me what happened…
About NDLS: The New Delhi Railway Station is one of India’s largest stations—with a daily footfall of 500,000 passengers. It serves 350 trains per day across 16 platforms. The map looks like this:
Unprecedented crowds: Around 9 pm, there was an unplanned surge in numbers across Platforms 13, 14 and 15—where most were waiting to board trains to Prayagraj to attend the Maha Kumbh Mela. Many of them were waiting for two delayed trains: Swatantrata Senani Express and the Bhubaneshwar Rajdhani. The others were readying to board the train at platform 14—Prayagraj Express. (As with Indian news reporting, the details of a tragedy vary from one newspaper to another. Indian Express claims the two delayed trains were Uttar Sampark Kranti and Rajdhani Express.)
According to a vendor:
The crowd was beyond the limit, people were gathered at the (foot over) bridge. Such a huge crowd wasn't expected. I have never seen such a massive crowd at the railway station, even during the festivals. People from the administration and even NDRF personnel were there, but when the crowd exceeded the limit, it wasn't possible to control them,
The scene looked like this before the stampede:
Also this PTI photo that says it all:
Key point to note: According to railway authorities, they were selling 1,500 tickets per hour—far beyond the capacity of the station. Indian Express’ investigation reveals they sold 9,600 general class tickets between 6 pm and 8 pm. Yet they had no real plan for dealing with so many people.
Platform change: The trigger was an unexpected change in platforms—for Prayagraj Express. It was moved from Platform 12 to Platform 16. This resulted in a mad exodus out of Platform 12—which resulted in a fatal bottleneck—according to one of the coolies (watch his account here):
Prayagraj Special was supposed to leave from platform number 12, but it was shifted to platform number 16. When the crowd waiting at platform 12 and the crowd waiting outside tried to reach platform 16, people started colliding and fell on the escalator and stairs.
This clip seems to have been taken mid-stampede. There’s a flash of an unconscious child (we hope) that is hard to see—but we believe it is important not to look away:
Deny, deny, deny: Officials initially denied there was any stampede—then denied there were any fatalities—and continue to insist there was no last-minute change in platforms. Even after the tragedy became undeniable, BJP IT cell chief Amit Malviya tweeted out this video at 12:54 am—with the caption: “New Delhi railway station as of now.”
The fallout: Eighteen people died—including 11 women, four children and three men.
Ok, so who or what’s to blame?
Well, officials want to blame it on unplanned train delays—and crowd panic. But we can start with the most obvious: The Maha Kumbh Mela. Everyone knows trains and stations will be overcrowded. Yet railway authorities seem to always be caught unprepared—irrespective of which party is ruling the roost.
The UPA era debacle: In 2013, 42 people were killed in a stampede at the train station in Prayagraj—the other end of the rail yatra. At the time, the UP cabinet minister Mohammad Azam Khan—part of the Akhilesh Yadav government—in charge of Kumbh Mela preparations resigned. But the UPA Minister of Railways Pawan Bansal shrugged away any blame: "There were too many people on the platforms. The station was overcrowded." Duh!
The real culprit is a colossal misdiagnosis of the root cause: terrible infrastructure.
What does that mean? A problem with railway stations?
The root causes run deeper than just that—but we will get to stations later.
First, train delays: The main reason why so many people were trapped on a handful of platforms on Saturday night. It was hardly unusual. Just last month, over 100 trains were delayed by up to 13 hours thanks to Delhi fog. Most of the passengers were stuck at the same station. Delays are also common during festival season (Dussehra/Diwali)—when hundreds of thousands of migrant workers head home. They routinely result in overcrowding on platforms—which leads to anger, panic and chaos. Cue the occasional stampede.
Data point to note: Passenger trains lost over 10 million minutes in delays in 2022-23: “One year comprises 5,25,660 minutes. By that measure, the time lost (theoretically) by the Railways due to delay is nearly 14 years for passenger trains.” To be fair, the delays dropped by a very modest 8% last year.
All of which raises an obvious question: why do our trains run late?
Because they are slower: Times of India found that the average speed for passenger trains declined by more than 5 km/hour in 2023 compared to the year before—dropping from 47.6 kmph to 42.3 kmph. The average speed of freight trains fell as well—from 31.7 kmph to 25.8 kmph. Btw, this includes those Vande Bharat trains. None of our trains are ‘express’ by any global measure.
Because we lack ‘capacity’: We simply don’t have enough tracks to run our trains:
The fundamental constraint on the operations of the Indian Railways arises from the acute shortage of physical capacity, which has resulted in the severe congestion on the network. In several major trunk routes, tracks are handling capacities that are in excess of 140-150% of the rated capacity.
Irony alert: The government has spent vast amounts on its beloved Vande Bharat trains, but not on the tracks that support their intended speed:
Even the government’s flagship Vande Bharat trains, designed to run at speeds of 110 km per hour to 130 km per hour, have failed to touch the average speed of even 100 km per hour. Officials told The Hindu that it was not safe for trains to run beyond a particular speed if the tracks were not in proper condition.
Yet the government seems to have no interest in raising the number or quality of railway tracks. But it is very much invested in increasing the number of trains.
Too many trains: Every month or so, there is great hue and cry about overcrowded trains. The government’s solution is always the same: roll out more trains. Last April, the Railways promised to run 43% more trains to deal with the summer rush. For festival season, Northern Railways announced over 3,000 extra trips in October and November. When it came time for Maha Kumbh, it rolled out 300 special trains to Prayagraj—boasting that railways would run around 13,000 trains in all during the Mela.
The problem? We already have far too many trains:
Every year, a rail budget is released, and new trains are introduced alongside new changes. So, due to this every rail has more train every passing year. Though the additional trains help to reduce ticket shortages and eliminate the need for people to search for trains between two stations, it also means that the tracks on busy routes are always crowded. In simple language the situation of Indian roads and railway tracks are getting the same.
Adding vanity express trains just compounds the matter:
The introduction of the Vande Bharat trains, for instance, distorts the traffic priorities of the railways because they actually lower (emphasis added) the capacity of the network on which they run. This is because these faster trains require many other trains — which are slower, including the many goods trains — to be moved off the track when these fancier trains need the tracks for their runs.
Data point to note: To be fair, this is not a new problem. Rail tracks have long been a neglected step-child—as these numbers show:
There has been a 56% increase in the daily tally of passenger trains over 15 years—from 8,520 in 2000-01 to 13,313 in 2015-16. The number of freight trains increased by 59% in the same period. But the running track length for all these trains increased by only 12% in 15 years—from 81,865 km to 92,081 km.
Okay, but how does this connect to the stampede, again?
Here’s the chain of cause-effect: Since the government rolled out all those special trains, there were more people at the station. They were left stranded on the platforms—and packed like sardines—because a number of these trains ran late. These were delayed due to slow speeds and limited capacity—i.e tracks needed to run these trains.
FYI, we got a preview of the stampede last week in Bihar—where the rail system is collapsing under Maha Kumbh pressure:
What began as an anticipated surge of pilgrims has now spiralled into a full-blown crisis. The railway network, ill-prepared for the sheer volume of people flocking to Prayagraj for a holy dip in the Sangam since Jan 13, is struggling under the weight of the unprecedented demand. The result? Trains running hours behind schedule, stations overcrowded beyond control and a wave of destruction sweeping across Bihar's railway divisions.
There have been violent clashes between passengers on overcrowded trains—and rage-fuelled vandalism in railway stations:
Despite operating at maximum capacity, the railway network is buckling under pressure. Pilgrims endure long delays, packed platforms and insufficient facilities at major stations like Prayagraj and Patna. “The situation is unbearable. We are waiting for hours in long queues, there are hardly any sanitation facilities and there is no crowd management at all,” said Satyadeo Prasad, a frustrated passenger from Patna.
The key word here being ‘capacity’. In other words, the stampede in New Delhi was a tragedy already in the making.
How about improving stations—if not tracks?
Ah, yes. The government does indeed have bold plans to give the biggest stations a fancy makeover. For example, it unveiled this Rs 4500 crore ‘futuristic’ plan for the New Delhi Railway Station:
Futuristic has turned out to be closer to fantastical—as in, there has been nary a sign of progress since.
Five-star fantasies: Since 2016, the Indian Railways has been promising us “flamboyant buildings with airport-like facilities, helipads, executive lounges.” Last year, the Railways Ministry again announced plans to make 110 major city stations “world class”—but its definition is a bit suspect. Architect Gautam Bhatia writes in The Hindu:
Redeveloped by the Indian Railway Stations Development Corporation, the primary thrust is beautification: to make the station building palatable to the eyes of the international tourist. In most cases, the architecture proposed is successful eyewash, buildings that are Berlin’s Hauptbahnhof from a distance, but Delhi’s Paharganj from inside.
The amalgam is to be achieved without major reorganisation, but merely brightened by glass fabrication, drop lights, graphic displays, escalator movement, all within impressive long steel roof spans. The insertion of a concourse in the New Delhi revamp, a 5-star hotel at Gandhinagar Station, food plazas in Surat, and a lotus fountain landscape in Amritsar, are all carefully added distractions that attempt in the long run to make the future railway experience as far removed from the current one as possible.
None of which will ease the most pressing needs of working class Indians sleeping on the platform, waiting 12 hours for their train—which represents their “permanent and only lifeline.” Or the occasional death sentence—as we witnessed on Saturday.
The bottomline: Enuf said.
Reading list
Indian Express and Mathrabhumi have the best—if slightly varying accounts—of the tragedy. The Quint has eyewitness accounts. Architect Gautam Bhatia pens a scathing op-ed on the folly of the planned station revamp. The Hindu and Business Standard offer data on train delays. Scroll and The Wire have the best analysis of the problem of too many trains—running on too few tracks. Our previous Big Story offers the big picture on Indian trains—slow, unsafe and expensive.
