Videos from the scene showed victims being rushed to ambulances or lying motionless on the ground after a large crowd broke through police barricades.

Between 90 to 100 million pilgrims had congregated to take ritual baths in sacred rivers at a festival in northern India.

Dozens of people were killed in a pre-dawn stampede at the Maha Kumbh Mela in northern India on Wednesday as tens of millions of Hindus gathered to take a dip in sacred river waters on the most auspicious day of a six-week festival.