I lost her, recalled Sukriti Raut, who lost her 17-year-old cousin, Akriti Kumari, in a stampede that killed 19 people, including four children, at West Bengal’s Chorebagan Durga Puja pandal on Saturday evening. The pressure was increasing with every passing second, and there was no way out.
Four of the deceased were children. “He (Sandip) would every day visit the local puja pandal on his bicycle and give us updates. Tagar took her children to their uncle’s house in Kolkata to visit some of the pandals and was supposed to return the next day.
At least 19 people were killed, including 13 females and six males. The oldest victim was a 66-year-old man from Malipanchghara in Howrah district, while the youngest was a 13-year-old boy from Agarpara in North 24 Parganas district.
Now their bodies are coming back,” a relative, Subrata Pramanik, told HT over the phone.
I lost her. It was Akriti’s first trip to Kolkata. The cousins were on their way out when the award-winning pandal was drawing heavy footfall. “We had seen the idol and were going out. My sister (Akriti) was holding my hand. The pressure was increasing with every passing second. There was no way out. She wasn’t being able to take the pressure anymore, and she fell down. Somebody pulled me out and I got saved. She had come with her family from Bihar to stay at a relative’s house in Bally, Howrah. Meanwhile, the Srivastava family from Muzaffarpur in Bihar had come to Kolkata for pandal-hopping and had put up at a relative’s house. They went to Chorebagan where the stampede took place. Abhishek’s wife Nibha and another family member sustained minor injuries and returned home. We are shattered.
The family lost two of its members — Abhishek Kumar Srivastava (38) and his son, Ayansh, aged ???. “They left the residence at around 5 pm.
My sister died,” Sukriti said. We never thought that this trip would cost their lives,” Rajesh Srivastava, Abhishek’s brother, said.
