Devotees during the rath yatra in Puri; (below) volunteers take an injured devotee to hospital. (AP, PTI)

Bhubaneswar, July 4: Six devotees were killed today in a stampede outside the 12th-century Jagannath temple in Puri during the annual rath yatra as chief minister Naveen Patnaik watched from a podium 300 metres away.

Witnesses said the stampede occurred as thousands of devotees jostled to get a better view of the deities — Jagannath, Balaram and Subhadra — when they were being carried through a narrow passage to their chariots parked in front of the temple’s main entrance.

As the crowds swelled, a barricade collapsed, said Somnath Bhuyan, a witness.

Two of the dead, Binodini Patnaik and Pravasini Parija, had been identified till late this evening.

Among the 15 injured, Sarat Panda and Biswanath Pujari were moved to a hospital in Cuttack. The rest were at the Puri district headquarters hospital.

More than 20 devotees, including children, were taken to hospital by police and volunteers. Six of them were declared dead on arrival, said Puri superintendent of police Asit Panigrahi.

“We have received six bodies so far. All the victims are aged between 40 years and 50 years.… They might have died because of stampede or suffocation,” chief district medical officer, Puri, Trilocan Baral said, adds PTI.

Three of the dead were women.

The names of some of the injured at the Puri hospital have been released: Dukhi Behera, Ramesh Singh, Sridhar Mohanty, Manmohan Das, Khageswar Mallick and Prakash Das.

Chief minister Patnaik, who was watching the proceedings, has ordered an administrative inquiry into the stampede by Santosh Kumar, a member of the revenue board.

Later, the chief minister visited the Puri hospital and met some of the injured. He announced a compensation of Rs 1 lakh each for the families of the dead and said the state would pay for the treatment of the injured.

Gajapati Dibyasingha Dev, the king of Puri, performs a ritual during the procession. (PTI)

Temple officials said the number of devotees who had come to the temple town for the rath yatra this year touched 10 lakhs, which was more than last year. But there were fewer pilgrims from Bengal because of a disruption in train services after the rain and floods.

Local priest Ramachandra Mahasuar, 65, described today’s rath yatra stampede as the most frenzied in recent times.

In 2006, four devotees had died in a stampede inside the temple on November 4 during the Kartik Purnima festival. Fifteen years ago, many lost their lives in a stampede during the Nagarjuna Besha, another important festival.

“I do not recollect a stampede in Puri during the rath yatra,” the temple’s chief administrator, S.C. Mohapatra, said.