00:00Let me first take an update from my colleague Anupam Mishra who's been bringing us all of the
00:05latest that's happening. Anupam, I want clarity on two aspects here and briefly so. Number one,
00:11the fact that there was maladministration, that's what everybody's alleging. You know,
00:18a few days ago, like in fact yesterday and day before, there were videos coming in from Cholbagan
00:23where one could see the crowd was in fact breaching barricades. That's the amount of
00:28crowd that was, you know, found at the lane itself, that narrow alley itself. And despite that,
00:35the police could be seen pushing them into one side. Why manage the crowd in a way where you
00:41definitely are seeing lapses? Why not bring in more reinforcements? Why not already take the
00:46measures on the ground instead of waiting for this disaster to take place? And the second question
00:51is of the dark theme, not the first Pandal to have a dark theme in Kolkata. What went wrong here?
01:01Well, you know, it's obvious that the crowd management has failed yesterday and some of them are saying
01:10that suddenly a heavy downpour started at around 7.30, 7.35 and then thousands of people who were
01:21outside at the Pandal rushed inside the Pandal. But every year we have seen Durga Puja during rains and every
01:30year rains happen.
01:31So this is a very clear thing that crowd management was failed there. A lot of volunteers were needed. And
01:40we knew and everyone knew that Cholbagan for the past four, five years has become popular.
01:46And people were thronging from Dhritia or Tritia. And this year also we have seen large crowds, huge crowd gathering
01:54outside Pooja Pandal in North Kolkata, especially North Kolkata.
01:58And that is that too where the narrow violence are there. So the crowd management somehow failed and they couldn't
02:07anticipate that kind of thing which may happen in Cholbagan.
02:13That is clear. And the second thing is that several people are saying that this whole area was extremely congested.
02:24And the theme, especially the dark theme has been, we have seen a lot of Pooja Pandals with dark theme,
02:34but that may not be the main reason.
02:37The main reason may be the crowd management entry and exit points that should have been managed more suitably.
02:46Much more efficiently, definitely. The planning definitely seems to have had several loopholes in it.
02:53Anupam, thank you for bringing us those details and we will keep coming back to you for more updates as
02:57they unfold.
