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Lucknow, Sunday (AFP)

At least 13 people died in a stampede here after a political rally by India's Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani, witnesses said.

Police said 25 others were injured in the stampede that began when people headed for the main railway station in Lucknow, the capital of the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, to catch trains home.

Bua Singh, chief of India's Railway Protection Force, confirmed 11 deaths but rescuers at the site reported 13 dead and warned the toll was likely to rise as many of those injured were in serious condition.

State deputy police chief D. P. Sinha said people from the rally climbed down stairs to reach the platform and began jostling passengers. In a sudden rush they toppled and fell over one another. Singh said some 150,000 of them headed for the station after the rally ended and choked the facility into a sea of humanity.

Three of the thousands who thronged the station climbed atop a passenger train to reach home but were critically injured when they came into contact with high-voltage overhead rail traction cables, railway police chief Singh added.

City authorities cordoned off the rail station and rushed in police contingents. Sinha said the victims were supporters of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which governs Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, jointly with Advani's Hindu nationalist BJP party.

Witnesses said the station was crowded with thousands of people when the stampede occurred, adding that many of the injured were rushed to hospital nearly an hour after the accident.

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