The Uttar Pradesh government has ordered a judicial probe into the deaths of at least 30 people in stampedes at India’s Kumbh Mela festival, where millions of Hindu devotees gathered for a ritual bath at the confluence of three sacred rivers.

Grieving families in India are cremating their loved ones while others are caring for their injured relatives in hospitals a day after a stampede.

People were trampled as pilgrims at the Maha Kumbh Mela, one of the world’s biggest gatherings, gathered where the Ganges and Yamuna Rivers meet.

The late release of casualty figures at the gathering of millions of people was seen as shielding the political fortunes of a local leader with national aspirations.

At least 17 people were killed and many more injured in a stampede at the world’s largest religious gathering early Wednesday, a doctor at a government hospital said, as millions of pilgrims rushed to dip in sacred waters during the Maha Kumbh festival in northern India.

Nearly 40 people were killed in India's northern state of Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday and several others injured in a pre-dawn stampede at the Maha Kumbh Mela - a Hindu religious festival touted to be the largest human gathering in the world.

Millions of Hindus are gathering in a northern Indian city for the Maha Kumbh festival, the world’s largest religious congregation