Honour the dead by ending stampedes at public places

I vividly recall that day in 1982 when tragedy struck in the Qutb Minar. An excited party of schoolchildren was running down the winding stairs, someone stumbled, and there was a cascade of children. Since then, the Minar's door has been locked, and we have been denied that spectacular view from the balcony of the first floor.

- Narayani Gupta

After the horror of the night of February 15, 2025, should New Delhi Railway Station be locked for 40 years? Newspaper reports have a weakness for the word "unprecedented". But it is not appropriate for this incident - not many days ago, there was a precedent of a stampede at Prayagraj. That was at a ghat, this at a station full of people headed for that ghat. Slithery sand in the first, dysfunctional escalators and a lack of clear announcements in the second.

Another memory -- my great sense of anxiety on a December night in 1998, when at New Delhi Station a change in platforms was announced with 10 minutes for the arrival of the train, and I had to negotiate those terrible stairs with my poor husband who had a weak leg. Multiply that situation a hundred-fold, add "unreserved" tickets and lack of clarity of train names.