Crowd Crush: An Avoidable Disaster
Pulling a crowd is relatively easier than safe and secure dispersal of the crowd to their places, needing more mindfulness and immersion of the organizers.
Differences of opinion within a group or among couples are a widespread phenomenon, but when a person grows to see these differences regularly, perhaps it builds an easygoing personality within the individual.
As I was growing up, during my childhood days, on many instances I had seen my grandparent’s disagreements on numerous issues. To summarize, they hardly ever agree on any single point, and one such contentious issue was traveling.
Grandpa was a homebody person while Grandma was a hodophile, loving to travel to various places and explore the world around her.
Probably, this used to be the major dispute between them, during the dissension either one of them came victorious, and the other in an obscure grumbling voice, had to obey. Most of the time Grandma used to prevail over Grandpa.
On that other day as I entered home, picked up by Grandpa from the school bus, my worshipper Grandma in a mellifluous voice enquired about Grandpa and his mood, an uncommon query from her side. Her sweet, smooth, and musical voice of speech used for Grandpa raised my snoopy antenna. In a carefree voice with a hint of complaint, I said, “He is too slow. So, I flee to home. He is coming behind.”
“He is an old man dear, don’t complain about his speed. At twelve years of age, he used to cycle for ten km to reach school! Time weathers out the energy and vitality of a person dear, so don’t be sceptical about his slowness.”
It seemed an unassuming appreciation for Grandpa’s arduous labour at a young age simultaneously being hard on me. Granny, who was always on the run to find fault with her life partner, and praise for her grandchild on that occasion sounded kooky. However, neither did I resist anything nor accept her sternness. I got engulfed in my playful world, keeping an ear open to find out the reason for the change in her voice.
Grandpa entered home with irritation, a routine behaviour, as I always leave him in the middle of the road and made a rush towards my safe abode. On that day, Granny in a strange manner said, “Dear! you should listen to your grandpa on the road. There are moving vehicles and you should not leave off his hands halfway to residence!”
It was one of the few rare occasions when Granny agreed with Grandpa on any issue. However, the tonality of her voice made me guess that she must be having a hidden agenda that requires Grandpa’s approval. I was curious to know her wish while engaged in my playful world.
A couple of minutes passed with a casual conversation between both of them. On a lighter note, holding an affectionate yet causality at the same time in her throw-of-speech, she said,
“Listen, tomorrow is an auspicious day and everybody is going to that holy shrine. I just checked with the travel agent about the availability of a vehicle and he assured me about it. Should we all go and visit the holy shrine. What do you say?”
Without giving answers to his spouse, he looked around, perhaps to avoid eye contact and end the conversation. My playful world still being in school uniform caught his attention, “Hey, Buddy! Why haven’t you changed your clothes? Go, clean yourself.”
Perhaps, the aversion to talk about the proposal sent the rejection signal to Granny. In an approachable happy tonality, she said,
“Should we not go there, and it is an auspicious occasion and people from distant places are coming to pay homage. We live nearby, hardly a couple of hours away from the place, so why shouldn’t we take the locational advantage? And by the way who knows whether I would be alive or not by the next time of the occurrence of this phenomenal celestial concomitance.”
In an annoyed voice with firmness, he said, “Don’t speak like a teenage girl, you are a senior person with the responsibilities of your family. Don’t try to expose your family to the crowd, after which you will lose control over their safety, well-being, and timely return to home to resume their work from next day onward.”
The decisiveness of Grandpa shakedown the impulse of Granny but she has not relinquished yet the proposal of visiting the holy shrine on that important day. In a dubious and suspicious voice, she added, “We are a part of society, and we should celebrate various occasions like others. So, what’s wrong with following others?”
“Why are you failing to understand that our family consists of a small child? Do you think the long queue in the hot and humid weather, the squeezed space with a huge number of people that faintly allow oxygen supply in that closed room would help in any way to this little boy? And by the way, he is a small child and we are elderly people who might feel the urgency of going to urination, if such an emergency arises what would you do in a long waiting crowd? In a compressed and squashed environment if the boy starts crying how will you console him?”
Grandpa was sounding unyielding and obstinate, that was too harsh for Granny making her reserve and quit. Within a few seconds he developed sympathy for her feelings, adjusting his voice to compassion he said,
“Look dear, I feel equally emotional about the religious practices but when safety and security issues arise, my priority will be safety first. You need to understand that the increase in the economic fortune of people and accessibility to these places of significance are multiplying the traffic flows to these significant sites.
To avoid any untoward situation in such mass gatherings, the organizers must have been following the multilayer functionality of coordination work. But despite all their efforts if by chance, any minor breakdown happens in any loop, automatically and instantaneously gets converted into tragedies and catastrophes.
Besides these unfortunate incidents, hardship comes in the form of traffic jams, the ordeal of remaining dehydrated, etc. that dissuade me from being part of mass gatherings. Don’t worry we will visit this significant place on some other day when such a massive crowd is not there, and you will be able to devote your time to the lord without any hardship.”
The crowd crush on 29th January at the Kumbha Mela 2025, followed by traffic jams and related ordeal for the travellers in the subsequent time, enumerated the bygone days of yesteryears in memory.
Pulling a crowd is relatively easier than safe and secure dispersal of the crowd to their places, needing more mindfulness and immersion of the organizers. Hope that the organisers would implement the lessons learnt from the incident at 2025 Kumbha Mela and during the next mass gatherings, we do not witness such lapses.
It also reminds me about the crowd crushes happening in developed countries during popular games and concerts. The learning from these events should be taken as wake up calls, so that the right protocols of safety, security and crowd dispersal is ensured during such events in future.
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