Stampede at food distribution centre kills 11 in Pakistan

At least 11 women and children were killed in a deadly stampede at a Ramadan food and cash distribution centre in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi on Friday, police and rescue officials said, as the country struggles with surging food prices.

The stampede happened when hundreds of women and children panicked and started pushing each other to collect food outside a factory in a well-known industrial area, known as SITE or Sindh Industrial and Trading Estate.

Business owners during the holy month of Ramadan often hand out cash and food, especially to the poor.

As the stampede began, some women and children fell into an open drain, local police official Mughees Hashmi said. Residents said a wall also collapsed near the drain, injuring and killing people. The incident left the street that leads to the factory littered with wounded people and dead bodies.

Several people were also injured in the stampede. Hashmi said eight women and three children died.

A survivor, Baby Khursheed, 35, said she went to the factory to collect supplies with two of her elder sisters, Sabira Khatoon and Naseem Bano, who both died in the incident. “There were hundreds of women in the street, the factory staff was allowing only a few of them at a time to collect rations,” she said. The street where people had gathered was narrow, she added.

Khursheed, who had bruises, said that as the crowd swelled, a water pipe burst. Cries for help went up and the factory staff tried to control the situation by opening a gate along the street, she said.

Murad Ali Shah, the top elected official in the Sindh, has ordered an investigation into the deadly stampede that resulted. He also asked charities and business owners to inform police before organising such Ramadan handouts.

Shortly after the incident, police detained some of the factory's employees for questioning.

It is the deadliest stampede at a food distribution point since the start of fasting during Ramadan. With the latest incident, the death toll from stampedes at free food centres across the country has risen to at least 21 since last week.

Hashmi said the factory owner who organised the food distribution centre had not alerted police about the plan. He said local police were unaware of the distribution, otherwise they might have deployed forces.

Weekly inflation is 45%, unseen since Pakistan got its independence from British colonial rule in 1947. Rising food costs and soaring fuel bills have raised fears of public unrest.