india

Updated: Dec 21, 2018 00:03 IST

Eight people suffered injuries when a stampede broke out late on Thursday night during a concert held at Mithibai College, Juhu. The injured were admitted to the nearby RN Cooper Hospital. One person suffered a rib fracture and three were stable, but in the surgical intensive care unit (SICU) at the time of going to print.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said the stampede occurred during a concert by rapper Divine, who was performing at Mithibai College’s annual Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS) festival – Colosseum – at Jashoda Rang Mandir (JRM) Ground.

An official from the BMC’s disaster cell said, “The incident was first reported at around 10:30pm. It was an open ground and as the gate crashed, the kids received severe injuries.” Initial reports suggest the stampede may have been triggered by a group of teenagers trying to enter the college ground. JRM Ground has an estimated capacity of 1,000.

One student told HT that “hundreds had gathered by 7.30pm for Divine’s concert” and that “nothing was under control”.

Thursday was “Pro-nite”, and passes were given out in advance for the event, according to college officials.

“The event started at 8pm, but around 9pm, some outsiders tried to barge through the gate to attend the event,” said Mithibai College principal Rajpal Hande. “We tried telling them that entry without passes is not allowed but they still tried to force the gate open and that is when some of them fell.”

He added that the event’s security personnel and college students immediately came to the rescue of those injured students and took them to Cooper Hospital. “We called off the programme after the incident,” Hande added.

Doctors from RN Cooper Hospital said two women and six men, between the ages of 20 to 24 years, were brought with injuries mainly in the chest region. “Three patients are currently admitted in the surgical intensive care unit (SICU) and one of them has suffered a rib fracture. Five patients have taken discharge against medical advice to be admitted at nearby private hospital. As per the case history, patients have suffered injuries to chest and limbs due to the stampede that occurred at the college. All of them are currently stable,” said the on-duty administrative medical officer.

According to Cooper Hospital, the three admitted to the SICU are David Bangera (20), Nikhil Pawar (15), and Hitesh Kamble (20), and are in “poor condition”. Five others – Kunal Chavan (17), Max D’Souza (18), Shadab Shaikh (24), Kalyani Agarwal (18) and Prutha Vetaskar (19) – are stable.

Darshil Shah, chairperson, Colosseum festival, told HT, “There was no stampede as such. The students were pushing each other to get inside the concert venue. There were some unruly people in the rear, and they created a ruckus. They didn’t have tickets and some of them had fake passes.”