Hyderabad:
Three women have died in a stampede at a rally of Telugu Desam president and former Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu in Andhra Pradesh’s Guntur district. This is the second incident in a span of four days that people lost their lives at a public event of Mr Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party, which has been holding a series of political meetings across the state in preparation for the 2024 assembly elections in the state.
Mr Naidu said the incident was extremely unfortunate and announced a compensation of ₹ 5 lakh for each of the families that have lost their loved ones.
A top police officer from Andhra Pradesh told NDTV the public meeting had been completed and Mr Naidu had left the venue for his residence when the tragedy took place.
After the public meeting, there was a programme by local Telugu Desam Party leaders to distribute sarees as gifts from Chandrababu Naidu to the women for Sankranti, the harvest festival coming up in two weeks.
“Some 4,000 women had gathered to get the Chandrababu Sankranti Kanuka. Barricades had been erected, so queues could be maintained. On the other side, dinner packets were being distributed. Suddenly a barricade gave way and the stampede happened,” the officer told NDTV.
The police chief of Guntur told reporters that enough police protection given to the programme.
“200 policemen and rope parties were deployed. The incident happened because of the barricade collapse at the first counter… the deputy superintendent of police was on theb spot at the moment and has rescued a few women,”he added.
