Prayagraj, which is hosting the Maha Kumbh Mela, is now under siege.
The siege has been laid by none other than a sea of humanity, descending upon the city from all directions through all arterial roads. This massive inflow of people has caused long traffic jams on all highways connecting Prayagraj to other districts of Uttar Pradesh.
All arterial roads clogged
Locals say all arterial roads are witnessing long traffic jams. “On the Prayagraj-Lucknow highway, there is a traffic jam till Nawabganj, located 23 km from Prayagraj. On the Pryagraj-Mirzapur highway, connecting the city to Varanasi in the east, the traffic jam extends beyond Karchana up to a distance of 25 km,” Banwarilal Kushwaha, a businessman running a general store in Teliarganj in Prayagraj told The Federal.
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“On the Prayagraj-Kanpur highway, the traffic was already disrupted even before Kumbh Mela began due to construction work on the highway. Only a narrow line of traffic flow was being allowed from both directions on one side of the four-lane highway and that flow has now come to a virtual standstill.”
Heavy congestion on Prayagraj-Rewa highway
The highway linking Prayagraj with Rewa in Madhya Pradesh is the worst affected and the traffic congestion stretches to several kilometres of the highway. A businessman hailing from Rewa told The Federal that while it used to take him three to four hours to reach Rewa from Prayagraj, he has been stuck in the traffic for the past 24 hours, thanks to the stranded vehicles jamming the entire stretch of the route.
Mini traffic jam every 200 metres
Same is the case with Jussi, located around 45 km from Prayagraj. Vehicles are lined up to a distance of 20-25 km on the Jussi road for the past two to three days, locals said. While motorists in this region do not adhere to lane discipline, there are fewer police personnel to enforce regulation and traffic regulation is monitored only at a few main junctions. After waiting for several hours and unable to move forward, many vehicles have tried to make a U-turn to go back, worsening the traffic congestion in the process.
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There is a mini traffic jam every 200 meters. The moment traffic authorities and police decongest one area, another jam crops up in the vicinity.
Essentials fail to reach Kumbh city
As a result of the massive traffic jam, the supply of all essential commodities to the city has been disrupted. Prayagraj residents have not got milk supply for the last two days. The supply of fresh vegetables has been disrupted for more than a week, jacking up the prices to 50-100 per cent of the original rates.
LPG supplier Indane cannot operate its trucks carrying cooking gas cylinders and there is no gas cylinder supply in the town. There is no petrol or diesel in the petrol bunks in the city.
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Newspapers too are not available and medical supplies to the pharmacies have been disrupted. The gridlock of the city has also prevented patients from as many as 150 villages in the rural Prayagraj district from coming to the town for treatment.
Pilgrims throng city from far-off places
The siege, continuing for the last four days, has been laid by a sea of humanity converging into the city from all directions through all arterial roads.
According to the 2011 census, Prayagraj district had a population of 59,54,390. Now, it will be around 65-70 lakh. Imagine, a floating mass of five to six times the city’s population converging into the city from all directions. There are more outsiders in the city now than the number of local dwellers.
People are rushing to Prayagraj in droves not only from other districts of Uttar Pradesh, but also from Jabalpur, Katni, Satna and Maihar in neighbouring Madhya Pradesh and from as far as Samastipur in Bihar.
MP shuts access to city
While pilgrims who come to Prayagraj for the Kumbh Mela also visit Maihar (in Madhya Pradesh) to pay obeisance to Maa Sharda, the huge rush of devotees has prompted the Maihar administration to stop the transit of people coming via Prayagraj into the city Maihar.
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The Prayagraj district has a population density of 1,086 inhabitants per square kilometre which is almost half of that of Varanasi and even far less compared to that of Kanpur. The density is expected to have swelled by ten times during the ongoing Kumbh Mela. The city life has become chaotic with huge crowds milling around all its streets.
While the January 29 stampede at the Sangam Ghat that reportedly occurred due to massive crowding during the holy dip on Mauni Amavasya day resulted in 30 deaths and several injuries, Magh Poornima, an auspicious bathing day, slated for Wednesday (February 12) precipitates another crisis.
Why the sudden rush?
What’s behind this sudden rush? Why has the administration failed in controlling the crowd? Why has it been unable to ensure essential supplies?
Locals attribute the situation to three factors: the arrival of people to the city ahead of the auspicious Magh Poornima, the return of students and working professionals to the city after holidays and the VIP security arrangements put in place for President Droupadi Murmu’s visit on Monday which disrupted the usual flow of traffic.
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Krishna Mohan, a young BJP activist, says, “The crowds are unbelievably huge. Nobody can give even an approximate assessment. It is impossible to even keep a count. On all roads leading to Sangam, we see only a sea of humanity. The main reason for the sudden rush is that February 12 is Magh Poornima day. A ‘snan’ or holy dip in Sangam on that day is considered highly auspicious by Hindus. This time the crowd is much more than what we witnessed during Mauni Amavasya”.
Influx of pilgrims, return of locals
A lecturer at Allahabad University attributes the traffic jam to the return of people from villages to the city ahead of the reopening of schools, colleges and government offices on Monday (February 10). While schools and colleges, which were closed, reopened on Monday, the Allahabad University as well as the Allahabad High Court and all government offices started functioning on Monday.
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The lecturer says when more than a couple of crores of people came rushing in, the administration simply went into paralysis.
How all hell broke loose?
The administration had barricaded only a peripheral area of around 6 km radius around Sangam and allowed regulated entry from two or three approach roads, while allowing people to exit via two or three other roads converging near Sangam. This arrangement worked well up to a point though the strains were felt on the eve of Mauni Amavasya on January 29, the day of the gory stampede. But when more than a crore people came rushing in via all approach roads to Prayagraj and pushed their way to Sangam, all hell simply broke loose. The local police and administration managing the inner Sangam zone barricades simply gave up. They threw up their hands and left things to fate.
President’s visit added to pressure
The visit of President Droupadi Murmu to Prayagraj to take a holy dip in Sangam on Monday and the usual VIP security arrangements also disrupted the ordinary flow of pilgrims which was already under considerable strain.
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Senior journalist AP Singh in Prayagraj said the collapse of the administration now is far more dramatic than that compared with the administrative collapse during COVID-19 days. The panic-stricken officials blocked movements on all approach roads without allowing outflow of people on some roads. Luckily, a repeat of the stampede has so far not taken place. But even the administration officials are unable to move and police vehicles are stuck despite their blaring sirens.
Yogi invites pilgrims, but fails to puts checks in place
The government seems to be focused more on deriving political mileage than on crowd management. The top political leadership in Uttar Pradesh seems to be keen on deriving full political mileage from this religious mega event. So it has become primarily a political event. Even after the January 29 stampede, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath was personally urging people on TV to come and take a dip on Magh Poornima, assuring that full normalcy had returned. But his government has paid no attention to regulating such unprecedented crowds. Now, the crisis is not at the barricades. It has spread all over the besieged city.
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‘Trains stopped, so people came in vehicles’
An official of the Allahabad Municipal Corporation told The Federal, “People should have been allowed to enter Allahabad (Prayagraj) and Sangam through two roads and made to leave by two or three other roads. Checkpoints on all other roads could have averted a total siege. The Railways declared several special trains but has now cancelled all of them and has even closed the operation of Prayagraj stations. So when train services are not there, people started hailing vehicles and coming by road which added to the traffic jam. There is virtually no macro planning and authorities at different levels have simply given up.”
“It is a spontaneous and inevitable siege by people themselves and one can only hope that the administration does nothing short-sighted like uing force to break the siege. Even if it had handed over Kumbh Mela management entirely to the Army, it is doubtful whether this kind of siege for several days at a stretch could have been avoided,” he added.
Also read: Kumbh stampede: A deadly cocktail of ‘VIP culture’ and mismanagement
‘RPF clueless, commercial hub blocked, people fainting’
Shiv Sevak Singh, a former corporator, shared the chaotic situation the city is under at the moment.
“The police are mostly from other districts and RPF has no idea about Prayagraj roads. Civil Lines, the main downtown commercial hub, is blocked from all sides. Retailers cannot replenish their supplies from wholesalers there. From the Railway Station to Nawab Yusuf Road, the road from the High Court to Chowk—all routes have been barricaded. People who are tired of walking long distances are getting further fatigued by long waits at the barricades and many are just fainting. Even the local youth trying to take them to hospitals are stuck in the jam and the blockades. The sewers are blocked in many places, but municipal workers are not able to move to clear them. But there is mindless hype about the event from official quarters. Kumbh is a glaring example of the abject failure of the forces of Hindutva.”
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What has made the situation worse are social media posts by right-wing individuals and organisations calling people to visit the Mela on specific days to attain heaven. They create an image that you are missing something big in your life if you fail to take a holy ‘snan’ on the specific day.
This goads believers to start for Kumbh who finally reach to have ‘hellish experience’ in the name of heaven.