Call to collect dust touched by Bhole Baba led to Hathras stampede: Report

Mar 05, 2025 05:37 PM IST

A 1,680-page report submitted to the state government was tabled in the UP legislative assembly on Wednesday.

Following the stampede, which resulted in 121 deaths, a case was filed against 11 close aides of the satsang centre, including the chief organiser, Devprakash Madhukar. However, Bhole Baba, also known as Narayan Sakaar Hari, was not mentioned in the FIR filed at Hathras’s Sikandra Rau police station, nor in the 3,200-page charge sheet submitted before the Hathras court.

Also Read: 107 dead in stampede at religious preacher’s congregation in UP’s Hathras

Headed by retired Allahabad High Court judge Brijesh Kumar Srivastava, the judicial commission on Wednesday said that the call to collect Bhole Baba’s Charanraj was the main reason behind the crowd losing control. “The commission also visited the site and spoke to eyewitnesses, who revealed that Bhole Baba had stated that if his followers carried the ‘Charanraj,’ all their problems would be solved,” the report read.

Multiple theories had emerged regarding the cause of the stampede. However, the commission rejected the theory that some men used a toxic spray to incite the stampede. It concluded that affidavits claiming the toxic spray theory were deliberately spread by Bhole Baba’s followers to mislead the investigation.

“It’s unlikely that some people sprayed toxic spray which caused the stampede like situation. The statements of witnesses did not match with each other and it seemed like they all were instructed in a way to tell this story just to deflect the investigation in some other direction. Affidavits given in this regard were mostly made from one place which points that they were all a part of scheme and were sent to the commission. The language used in affidavits is also quite similar. A similar affidavit was also given by the counsel of Bhole Baba, which he denied during investigation,” said the report.

Also Read: Hathras tragedy underscores failure to learn from the past

The report added that there was excessive crowd at the venue, and no announcements were made from the stage instructing people to move in an orderly manner. It stated that the venue was so crowded that it took Bhole Baba around 30-35 minutes to reach the highway from the venue. According to eyewitness accounts, the crowd was three times the number of people allowed by the administration.

“The entire work of crowd management is done through their sevadars by keeping the police and administration away. No one is allowed to take photos, make videos, media are not allowed to cover the event and the police is not allowed to interfere in the management. To manage this event, people coming from different districts and different states of Uttar Pradesh are given the responsibility of organiser, sevadar and commander. Whose information is not given to the police administration and neither is their background verified,” the report said.

It added: “In such circumstances, the possibility of criminal conspiracy being involved as per a well-planned scheme to bring such an event into public discussion, to defame the government or to get some other benefit cannot be ruled out and the said fact is also strengthened by the fact that misleading facts have been presented in all the sponsored affidavits/applications with the intention of deviating the direction of the investigation, but it would be legal if this criminal aspect is investigated in depth by the SIT investigating the crime”.

Bhole Baba’s lawyer AP Singh stressed on the conspiracy theory, alleging that there were 15 to 16 unidentified men who sprayed poisonous spray to allegedly cause stampede and moved away from spot as dead bodies piled.