At 7.01am on Wednesday, as the city was still celebrating RCB’s historic IPL win, a tweet lit the fuse to a tragedy no one saw coming. The team announced a grand victory parade through the heart of Bengaluru, but even as fans erupted with joy, the city’s top police officers were left scrambling.

By nightfall, the celebrations had turned into chaos. Eleven people lay dead in a stampede outside the Chinnaswamy Stadium, and dozens more were injured. Behind the scenes was a tale of ignored warnings, last-minute political decisions, and a police force stretched to its breaking point, according to at least three government officials and as many police officials, familiar with the planning of the two celebratory events, the first at the Vidhana Soudha, the seat of power , and the second at the stadium.

When the tweet went out, some of Bengaluru Police’s staff, including many of the front-line police personnel, had just ended their days. They had been on duty till around 4 am on Wednesday, managing spontaneous celebrations in several places (the final match in Ahmedabad ended late Tuesday night).

RCB’s tweet took everyone, including senior officers by surprise.

“We assumed, logically, that nothing official would be scheduled the next day,” said a top-ranking police officer. “Everyone was exhausted. There was no time to plan anything.”

Confusion gave way to urgency. Calls were made, clarifications sought. It emerged that the RCB management had directly approached deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar for permission, the officer said.

“The police had been bypassed entirely in this decision making,” the officer added.

HT reached out to Shivakumar for a comment on the matter but didn’t get it till the time of print.

At around 8 am, Bengaluru police commissioner B Dayananda briefed chief minister Siddaramaiah about the parade. The commissioner urged that the event be deferred. “The commissioner proposed that the event be held on Sunday as it would be easier to plan. The biggest concern was the victory parade, which needed elaborate planning,” the officer added.

The chief minister didn’t respond to the request but said that he would schedule a meeting with everyone concerned later in the day, according to the police officer mentioned above.

Calls that changed everything

But behind closed doors, the wheels were turning. According to three police officials, RCB’s senior management reached out to the political leadership, including deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar for the second time.

“After the Commissioner’s briefing, a senior RCB official called the Deputy CM again. We were informed that there was displeasure expressed over the police’s opposition to holding the event on Wednesday. The city’s pride was cited among other reasons,” said senior bureaucrat, who didn’t want to be named.

The meeting the CM had promised to schedule happened at his residence at 11 am. It was attended by Chief Secretary Shalini Rajneesh, State Police Chief M.A. Saleem, ADGP Intelligence Hemant Nimbalkar, and top traffic and city police officers, along with RCB’s event partners from KSCA and DNA Networks, an event management company.

“Both traffic and city police reiterated their objections: they had no time to plan for crowd management, diversions, or emergency responses. The parade route was through the heart of the city, and the team would only be landing that afternoon,” said a senior bureaucrat who didn’t want to be identified.

According to a second senior police officer, when they asked the organisers about their plan of action, they said. “’ We allow the crowd until the stadium is filled, after which gates will be closed’. It was then we insisted on passes being issued.”

“During the meeting, the focus was on the victory parade since it was a bigger concern, which took the attention away from the crowd management. Eventually, it was decided that no victory parade would be held, but the Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister asked the police to make arrangements for the felicitation,” the second police officer said.

After the 11 am meeting, a decision was made to issue passes on the RCB website.

The RCB team arrived at the HAL airport at 2.45 pm, and the event at the Vidhana Soudha began at around 4.30 pm.

Meanwhile, around 250,000 thronged the streets near the stadium, which has a capacity of around 30,000 people. By 3.30 pm, all gates were closed as the stadium had filled to capacity.

Then came reports of fans being crushed at the gates. Four died at Gate 7, two at Gate 6, one at Gate 1, and four more between Gates 17 and 21. It is not clear why everyone decided to go ahead with the second event after news of the stampede. Nor is it clear who took the call.

The event at the Vidhana Soudha went until 5.30pm. By the time the team bus reached the stadium at 6.10pm, it was all over.