Patna, Oct. 18 -- Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) MP Manoj Jha on Sunday questioned whether standard operating procedures (SOPs) for crowd management were followed during the stampede at the Chorbagan Sarbojanin Durga Puja pandal in North Kolkata, which claimed 19 lives and left at least 25 injured.

Questioning the response to the tragedy, Jha, while speaking to ANI, said, "There are SOPs for crowd management. Were they followed? Will classifying this as an accident and announcing compensation bring back the loved ones lost by those families?"

He further criticised the approach of treating deaths as statistics, expressing disappointment with the system of governance.

"The problem is that, in our system of governance, such figures and deaths...