Mumbai stampede: 5 Shiv Sena men assault KEM doctor for marking numbers on foreheads of deceased

Five men donning Shiv Sena caps walked into the mortuary at KEM hospital on Saturday evening, roughed up Dr Harish Pathak, head of department, forensic medicine, and tried to scribble a number on his forehead.

The men were protesting against the hospital’s move to mark numbers on the foreheads of those who died in the stampede at Elphinstone Road foot over bridge. Following the attack, workers at the hospital’s mortuary have threatened to stop work. A journalist was also threatened. Of the five, two men were taken to the police room at the hospital.

Twenty-three people were killed and 39 others were injured after a stampede broke out on a crowded pedestrian bridge connecting two stations in Mumbai on Friday, one of the worst tragedies to hit the city’s teeming local train network.

It was unclear what caused the stampede, with official and witness accounts suggesting people may have panicked during the morning rush after believing there was a live wire or the bridge was about to fall.

“Some of the injured are in serious condition,” Deepak Sawant, the health minister of Maharashtra, had said at KEM hospital where the injured were taken.

The bridge, which connects Elphinstone and Parel stations, is usually crowded during rush hours, but it was more so on Friday morning after people huddled to take cover from a sudden downpour.