2 killed, 7 injured in stampede following landslide in Himachal's Una

Una (Himachal Pradesh): Two devotees were killed and seven others injured at a shrine following an early morning stampede triggered by a landslide in Himachal Pradesh's Una district on Monday, officials said.

The incident happened at Dera Baba Vadbhag Singh in shrine at Mairi village of Amb subdivision. The shrine is located around 40 km from Una and is visited by a large number of people seeking a cure for those possessed by 'evil spirits'.

Devotees who had come to take part in the Baba Vadbhag Singh fair were taking bath in the holy spring in Charan Ganga around 5 am when four-five big stones came sliding down from the mountain, police said.

Bathing in 'Charan Ganga' is considered sacred and there was a lot of crowd at the holy feet of Ganga on Monday due to the full moon.

Seeing the stones rolling down from the mountain, people started moving helter-skelter leading to a stampede, which caused injuries to nine devotees.

All the injured were rushed to the Civil Hospital Amb for treatment, where two devotees succumbed to injuries. The deceased were identified as Billa and Balveer Chand, residents of Punjab's Faridkot, the officials added.

The police sent the bodies for postmortem.

Five of the injured have been sent to Una Zonal hospital while two were referred to PGI Chandigarh.

ASP Sanjeev Bhatia said that the devotees who have been injured are under treatment.

Deputy Commissioner, Una, Jatin Lal said that devotees will not be allowed to take bath in the holy feet of Ganga until the situation becomes normal.

Statements of eyewitnesses from the incident site will also be recorded, so that the real reasons for the accident can be known, said SP Una Rakesh Singh.