Dussehra Fairs, Ravan Dahan and Durga Immersion: What Went Wrong on 19-21 October 2026 and How to Stay Safe

Between Monday 19 and Wednesday 21 October 2026, the last days of Navratri and the Durga immersions brought injuries and deaths across Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan and Delhi. A bag of crackers exploded in an immersion procession in Bhadohi. A balloon seller’s gas cylinder burst at a Dussehra fair in Kanpur. Women were hurt in a push at the exit of the Ravan dahan ground in Masaurhi, near Patna. A fair-market fire in Siwan was fought by fire engines that, residents say, reached the spot late. And in Gonda, Fatehpur, Prayagraj and Kota, at least eight people died while immersing idols, with more still missing. On the road to a fair in Sonbhadra a car hit a tempo full of passengers head-on, and in Delhi’s Vikaspuri the gate of a fair ride broke and two people fell. The details differ from place to place, but the failures are the old ones, again: one gate for a whole crowd, things that burn or burst in the middle of it, and water with no one watching. This page sets out what the reports say, where they disagree, and what a visitor, a family or a puja committee can do. Last checked: 21 October 2026, around 12 noon IST. Some figures are still moving, and several counts conflict between outlets.

In short

• Bhadohi, Tuesday 20 October: a bag of firecrackers exploded in a Durga immersion procession at Chauri Bazar. Reports count 6, 9 or 11 injured. No death was reported.
• Kanpur, Tuesday night: a balloon seller’s cylinder burst at the Dhariupurwa Dussehra fair before the Ravan dahan. Four to six people were hurt, including a two-year-old girl. The cause is not established.
• Masaurhi, Patna district, Tuesday evening: four women were hurt in a push at the main exit gate of Gandhi Maidan after the effigy was burnt. An ambulance got stuck in the traffic.
• Siwan, Monday 19 October: a market fire during the Mahanavami fair. Two outlets report the fire and no injuries; only one reports that fire engines were delayed by the crowds.
• Immersion drownings, Tuesday 20 October: Gonda, Fatehpur and Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh, and a boat capsize in a canal at Kota, Rajasthan. By our count from the reports, at least eight people are dead and at least four are still missing; the Gonda figures conflict between outlets (see below).
• Sonbhadra, Tuesday 20 October: a car and a tempo carrying people to a fair collided head-on at the Nadhira bend. Amar Ujala and Dynamite News report three dead and 16 injured, many of them children; the first reports said two dead.
• Delhi, Vikaspuri, about 1.36 am on Tuesday: the gate of a mixer ride broke at a Dussehra ground and two people fell and were taken to hospital. Police registered a case.
• Officials in Gonda, Prayagraj and Kota said the water spot was not a designated or permitted one. These are the officials’ statements; no inquiry has reported yet.

What the reports say, place by place

Bhadohi, Uttar Pradesh: crackers in a procession. On Tuesday 20 October a bag of firecrackers exploded in the immersion procession of the Chauri Bazar Navdurga Puja committee in the Chauri police station area. PTI quoted police as saying a spark from a cracker being lit landed on the crackers a young man was carrying. Additional SP Shubham Agrawal described a stampede-like situation and said the injured were taken to a nearby hospital. The number hurt differs. PTI said six people had burns. Dainik Jagran said nine were hurt and that the two youths carrying the crackers were badly burnt and sent to Varanasi. ETV Bharat said eleven were burnt, two of them with burns of about 40 and over 60 per cent, and put the time at about 3.30 pm and the blast about 20 metres from the pandal; Jagran only says evening. Police are investigating. We found no report of a death, an FIR or an arrest.

Kanpur: a balloon cylinder at a Dussehra fair. At about 11.15 pm on Tuesday night, before the Ravan dahan at the fair at Dhariupurwa in the Naubasta police station area, a cylinder used to fill balloons burst with thousands of people around, according to Dainik Jagran. Jagran and India TV counted six injured, including a two-year-old girl; ETV Bharat quoted the DCP (South) as saying four or five were hurt and all were out of danger. The balloon seller was reported seriously hurt and referred to LLR (Hallet) Hospital (Jagran); India TV called his condition critical. Jagran and India TV call it a carbide cylinder, ETV Bharat a balloon gas cylinder, and none of them names the gas. ETV Bharat reported a preliminary view that heat was the cause and that police found the cylinder hidden in the soil of a road divider. Police and the fire department are examining how it burst. We found no report of an FIR.

Masaurhi, Patna district: a push at the exit. On Tuesday evening thousands left Gandhi Maidan together once the Ravan effigy had burnt. Pressure built at the main exit gate and several women walking in front stumbled and fell, with the crowd behind them. Four women were hurt, one seriously (Amar Ujala, Prabhat Khabar). Both papers say the ground is lower than the road outside, which added to the pressure at the gate, and that the ambulance carrying the seriously hurt woman was caught in the jam made worse by a Ram-Janaki chariot passing through the market. Prabhat Khabar adds that residents asked why committee volunteers had left their posts, why so few police were at the exit and why no clear route had been kept open for ambulances. Those are residents’ questions, not findings. The SDO and the SDPO reached the spot and helped bring the crowd under control (Amar Ujala). No deaths were reported.

Siwan, Bihar: a market fire during the fair. On Monday 19 October, Mahanavami, a fire broke out in a market on the Siwan town side while the Durga Puja fair crowds were on the streets. FirstBihar described a fire in an AC repair and spare-parts shop in Kayum Market on the Siwan-Chhapra road, said a short circuit was suspected but not officially confirmed, and reported no casualties. Bhaskar English, which placed the fire in a market near P Devi More, reported that AC gas cylinders began exploding and that about 14 fire engines arrived within two hours. It said the engines were held up by the fair crowds and traffic, and quoted residents as saying two engines came with only half a tank of water and that senior officers did not answer calls. Only Bhaskar English reports those delay claims, and we found no reply from the fire department, so read them as claims. The two reports describe the location differently and we cannot say they are the same shop. We found no report of an injury.

Gonda, Uttar Pradesh: two accidents. At Laxmanpur ghat on the Tedhi river in the Tarabganj area, PTI reported that five young men from one village began to drown during an immersion; Dainik Bhaskar said six people were in the water, three were saved and three went under. PTI quoted SDM Savita Shukla as saying the spot was not a designated ghat and that the organisers had neither taken permission nor told the administration. Bhaskar quoted the SP as saying the inquiry will check whether permission was taken. The counts conflict. PTI (11.46 pm on 20 October) said one young man died and two were missing; its total for Gonda and Fatehpur together was four dead and three missing. On the morning of 21 October ETV Bharat (9.19 am) and Dynamite News (9.47 am) also reported one body recovered and two youths still sought, as did Bhaskar, while Amrit Vichar (8.46 am) said three of the five had died. Dynamite News’ headline says four dead at the two ghats, but its text confirms fewer. We show the ranges and treat none as final. At Bhainsahwa ghat on the Kuano river in the Dhanepur area, four young men started to drown and were pulled out by locals, but Tularam Shukla, who went in to save them, was lost. PTI, ETV Bharat and Amrit Vichar called him missing; Dainik Bhaskar and Dynamite News, on the morning of 21 October, reported his death confirmed after a search. Bhaskar also says a sub-inspector, a constable and a home guard were on duty at that ghat, with lighting arranged. Names and ages differ between reports, so we leave them out.

Fatehpur, Uttar Pradesh: bathing after the immersion. In a village in Fatehpur district (Chak Katoghan in PTI’s report), three teenagers aged 16 to 19 drowned in a village pond they had entered to bathe after an idol was immersed. Two others were rescued. SP Abhimanyu Manglik said two idols from one hamlet were meant for the designated Naubasta ghat, but some devotees took one idol to the village pond. Police urged people to immerse idols only at designated sites and not to bathe in ponds (PTI).

Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh: the Tons river. At about 10 am on Tuesday an uncle and nephew, aged 22 and 20, drowned in the Tons river at Devra village in the Kaundhiara police station area while taking part in an immersion. Divers recovered both bodies after three to four hours (Amar Ujala, Dainik Bhaskar). The station house officer said immersion was prohibited at that spot and that people had been told to use designated sites; the families said no police were deployed and no barricades had been put up (Amar Ujala). The SDM said each family would get Rs 5 lakh under the disaster relief provisions.

Kota, Rajasthan: a boat in a canal. On Tuesday evening a small wooden fishing boat carrying seven people and a Durga idol capsized in the right main canal of the Chambal (the Kotri canal) near the steel bridge on 80 Feet Road, in the Borkheda police station area. Three swam out and four went under. On Wednesday morning Amar Ujala reported that SDRF and NDRF teams had recovered two bodies and were still looking for two. Minister Madan Dilawar said the area is prohibited for immersion. SP Tejaswini Gautam said designated sites have boats and divers but such cover cannot be set up along the whole canal. About 2,000 cusecs were flowing after water was released two days earlier (ETV Bharat, Navbharat Times), and the flow was shut off to help the search. Reports differ on the ages (IANS says children, ETV Bharat quotes the Collector as saying about 20), so we leave names and ages out. Our case study on the Kota canal boat capsize has the full account.

Sonbhadra, Uttar Pradesh: a car and a tempo head-on. On Tuesday 20 October a tempo carrying people from Dharti Dand to a Vijayadashami fair at Kirbil, in the Myorpur area, and a car coming from the opposite direction collided head-on at the Nadhira bend, near the Nadhira forest on the Renukoot-Bijpur road, in the Bhanbhani police station area. The first reports gave two dead (a 12-year-old boy and a woman) and 12 to 14 hurt (ETV Bharat, Bhasha); Bhasha quoted Circle Officer Vinay Prabhakar Sahni and gave the time as about 4 pm. By Wednesday morning Amar Ujala and Dynamite News reported three dead and 16 injured, many of them children. Amar Ujala gives the dead as aged 12, 23 and 25 and says the third, a man, was referred to the district hospital and died on the way. Bhasha gives the woman’s age as 35 and a different name, so we leave names out. Amar Ujala and ETV Bharat say the car was travelling from Varanasi towards Chhattisgarh and Odisha, and ETV Bharat calls it out of control. The injured were taken to the community health centres at Bhanbhani and Myorpur, and some were referred on. Inspector-in-charge Arvind Kumar Saroj said inquest proceedings were under way, the bodies were being sent to Dudhi for post-mortem and further legal action would follow. We found no report of the cause, the car driver’s condition or an FIR.

Delhi, Vikaspuri: a ride gate that broke. At about 1.36 am on Tuesday 20 October, the gate of a “mixer” amusement ride broke at the Dussehra ground in F Block, Vikaspuri, west Delhi, and two people fell from the ride (PTI, ANI). They were taken first to Mata Chanan Devi Hospital and then to Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) Hospital, where they were being treated; their ages were not reported. A senior police officer told PTI that, going by preliminary findings, the two fell after the gate broke, and that police are examining how it broke and whether anyone was negligent. A mobile crime team inspected the spot. A case was registered at Vikaspuri police station: ANI says under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, and PTI cites Section 125(A). We found no report of an arrest, of whether the ride had permission or an inspection record, or of the condition of the two after the transfer to RML.

What these incidents have in common

• One way out for thousands. At Masaurhi the whole crowd left through the main gate at once, on ground lower than the road. The NDMA’s 2014 crowd guide lists reliance on one major exit route, and a collision of inward and outward flows, among the causes of crowd disasters. The Chorbagan pandal crush in Kolkata a few days earlier, which killed 19, started at an exit gate too.
• Things that burn or burst inside a crowd. A bag of loose crackers in a procession, a gas cylinder at a fair, AC gas cylinders in a market on fire.
• Water with no cover. A river ghat that was not designated, a village pond used for bathing, a canal where officials say immersion is prohibited. The WHO says children and young people aged 0 to 29 account for over half of all drowning deaths, and most of those who died here were young men.
• Help that cannot get through. An ambulance stuck behind a chariot at Masaurhi. In Siwan, fire engines reported slow in festival traffic.
• Rescuers who become victims. The man who went into the Kuano river to save four others was lost (reported dead by Dainik Bhaskar and Dynamite News, missing by PTI and ETV Bharat).
• Machinery and vehicles around a crowd. A fair ride gate broke in Delhi, and a tempo full of fairgoers was hit head-on in Sonbhadra. Neither report gives a final cause.

Going to a fair, Ravan dahan or pandal

These are plain habits that cost nothing. Our guide to pandals, melas and festival crowds has more.

• Look for the exit before you look for a place to stand. Note a second way out, and where the gate opens: onto a road, a slope, a market.
• Do not wait to leave until the effigy has burnt and everyone moves at once. Either go a little before the end or sit back and let the gate empty. The Masaurhi push came when thousands left together.
• Keep children by the hand, not just in sight. Fix a meeting point away from the gate and put a phone number in each child’s pocket.
• If you see someone carrying loose crackers or a gas cylinder through a crowd, move away and tell a volunteer or the police; do not stay to watch.
• Before you or a child get on an amusement ride, look at the gate, the safety bar and the latch. Do not board if anything is broken, loose or tied up with wire. This is our own general advice, not taken from the reports or from a rule.
• Keep the road to the venue free for ambulances and fire engines. Do not park or stop vehicles at the gate.
• If the crowd starts pushing, do not fight it. Keep your feet, hold your arms across your chest, and move sideways to the edge. Our guide on how to survive a crowd crush has the steps.

Gas cylinders at fairs: what we know and what we do not

Balloon sellers fill balloons from gas cylinders. The Kanpur reports call the cylinder a carbide cylinder and none names the gas, and the cause is not established, so we do not say what burst or why. What the standard chemical safety sheets say is general. The International Chemical Safety Card for hydrogen, prepared for the ILO and WHO, lists it as extremely flammable, says its mixtures with air are explosive and says a cylinder holding gas under pressure may explode if heated. The card for acetylene also lists it as extremely flammable with explosive mixtures. Calcium carbide is not a gas: its card says it forms a flammable gas on contact with water or damp air. PESO, the explosives regulator, lists both the Calcium Carbide Rules, 1987 and the Gas Cylinder Rules, 2016 on its website. No report says whether the Kanpur seller had any permission.

What follows is our own advice, not a quoted rule. As a visitor, do not stand next to a balloon seller’s cylinder, do not let children play around it, and move away if you hear hissing. As an organiser, keep gas-balloon sellers on the edge of the fair, away from the exits, the effigy and any fireworks, ask to see their permission, and keep a fire extinguisher close.

Crackers in a procession

The NDMA guide lists unauthorised fireworks in enclosed places, and fireworks made or sold in the wrong places, among the fire-related causes of crowd disasters. PESO publishes the list of fireworks authorised under the Explosives Rules, 2008. In a procession the safe rule is simple: nobody carries spare crackers in a bag or pocket while others are lighting crackers, and nobody lights a cracker in a packed lane. Bhadohi shows why. Our Diwali firecracker safety guide covers safe lighting and burns, and Diwali is only a few weeks away.

If someone is burnt: Cool the burn under cool, clean running water for 20 minutes. No ice, toothpaste, oil or butter. Call 108 for anything more than a small burn.

Immersion and water safety

• Use only the designated ghat or an artificial tank. The CPCB’s revised idol-immersion guidelines ask urban local bodies to arrange artificial ponds or tanks, to cordon off and barricade immersion points on river banks and lakes, and to send movable tanks to housing societies so that crowds do not gather at the water. Our safe idol immersion guide has a shore-first plan for families and organisers.
• Do not bathe or swim after the immersion. Fatehpur is the example.
• Do not put an idol on a small boat in a canal or river. The Kota boat was a fishing boat with the idol in the middle. If you must be on a boat, the American Red Cross says to wear a life jacket every time, whatever your swimming skill.
• Canals carry released water, and the flow can be fast and cold. At Kota about 2,000 cusecs were flowing. Ask the irrigation office or the police whether water has been released.
• If someone is in trouble, reach or throw, do not go in. Call 112 and point at the place where the person was last seen. Going in after a swimmer is how a rescuer becomes the next victim.

What organisers must have

Here we separate what the guides say from what we suggest. The NDMA’s 2014 guide, Managing Crowd at Events and Venues of Mass Gathering, asks organisers and local authorities for the following, among much else.

• Ample entries and exits, with emergency exits that are never barricaded, blocked or locked. It lists closed or locked exits and reliance on one major exit among the causes of crowd disasters.
• Ambulances stationed so they always have an unblocked route, a fully equipped medical unit during major festive events, first-aid kits, fire extinguishers of the right type, hydrants and water tanks at the site.
• Emergency routes clearly marked and kept free of the crowd, one-way movement on narrow approach roads, and enough lighting on the venue and the paths.
• Fire and electrical checks, and only authorised vendors.

For immersion, the CPCB guidelines call for designated and barricaded points or artificial tanks and, on the coast, motor boats with security personnel and safety equipment. For fireworks, PESO’s authorised list applies. State rules add detail. For this year’s Durga Puja Bihar ordered, in a statement reported by PTI and The Hindu on 6 October, compulsory licences for pandals, idols and immersion processions, fire-safety audits of large pandals, separate entry and exit points at crowded venues, medical teams, ambulances and SDRF personnel where needed, and divers and rescue teams at designated immersion ghats and Ravan dahan sites. We do not know whether those arrangements were in place at Masaurhi or Siwan. We did not find the text of an immersion or crowd order for Uttar Pradesh or Rajasthan, so ask your SDM or district disaster management authority which order applies where you are.

Our suggestions, which are not quoted from any rule: a named person at every exit, a written plan for what happens when the effigy burns, gas-balloon sellers kept away from the dense part of the fair, and at every immersion point a barricade, a light, a rope or life ring, divers or a boat where the water is deep, and an ambulance. If a spot is not permitted, put a guard and a signboard there and tell people which ghat to use.

Who to call

112 for any emergency, 101 for the fire brigade and 108 for an ambulance. Say the name of the fair, ghat or canal, the nearest landmark and what happened, and stay on the line.

What is still not known

• The final number of injured in Bhadohi and Kanpur, and the condition of the Kanpur balloon seller.
• What burst in Kanpur, and whether the seller had permission to keep and use the cylinder.
• Whether the two missing young men in Gonda have been found, how many died at the Tedhi river, and whether the Gonda rescuer is confirmed dead; PTI, ETV Bharat, Amrit Vichar, Dynamite News and Dainik Bhaskar differ.
• Whether the two men still missing at Kota have been found, and whether anyone will face action over the immersion at a prohibited spot.
• The cause of the Siwan fire, and the fire department’s answer to the delay claims.
• Whether the Masaurhi organisers had a permitted exit plan, whether Bihar’s order for separate entry and exit points was followed there, and any action over the missing volunteers.
• The cause of the Sonbhadra collision, the car driver’s condition, and whether an FIR has been registered.
• Why the Vikaspuri ride gate broke, whether the ride had permission and an inspection record, and the condition of the two injured.
• Except for the case registered at Vikaspuri police station, we found no FIR, arrest or inquiry report in any of these cases in the reports we read.

We will update this page if the picture changes. Last checked: 21 October 2026, around 12 noon IST, using reports published up to about 11.40 am.