Amarnath Yatra from Jammu halted again due to bad weather

The annual Amarnath Yatra on Saturday faced another disruption from Jammu following bad weather conditions that triggered multiple landslides on 270 km-long Jammu-Srinagar national highway in Ramban district, officials said.

“Two separate convoys of Amarnath pilgrims left Yatri Niwas base camp in Jammu city for the holy cave shrine on Saturday morning. Though the batch of 2,504 pilgrims, who preferred Baltal route, were allowed to reach Yatri Niwas base camp in Ramban district, another batch of 4,549 pilgrims, who preferred Pahalgam route, had to return to Jammu base camp from Udhampur’s Tikri area following landslides on the highway in Ramban district, said officials.

Overnight rains that continued on Saturday as well triggered fresh landslides, mudslides and shooting stones at Panthiyal, Cafeteria Morh and Mehar in Ramban district blocking the highway, they added.

The men and machinery of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) are on the job to clear the debris.

Though there are no stranded vehicles on the highway, fresh slides have blocked it at a few places and it will take some time to clear the debris, the officials said.

On Friday, no fresh batch of Amarnath Yatris was allowed from Jammu to the holy cave shrine in south Kashmir Himalayas due to inclement weather and bad condition on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway in Ramban.

However, nearly 5,000 Yatris from Jammu, who stayed overnight at Yatri Niwas in Ramban were allowed to proceed on Friday morning for Pahalgam and Baltal base camps in Kashmir following one-way restoration of the affected stretch.

Earlier, the Yatra was suspended from Jammu due to bad weather on July 10 and resumed on July 11.

The annual 43-day yatra commenced on June 30 from the twin base camps -- traditional 48-km Nunwan-Pahalgam in south Kashmir’s Anantnag and 14-km shorter Baltal in central Kashmir’s Ganderbal.

Over 2.3 lakh pilgrims offered their prayers at the cave shrine, housing the naturally formed ice-Shivlingam, the officials said.

A total of 1,24,714 pilgrims have left from Jammu’s Bhagwati Nagar base camp for the Valley since June 29, the day the first batch of pilgrims was flagged off by Jammu & Kashmir lieutenant governor (LG), Manoj Sinha. The yatra is scheduled to end on August 11 on the occasion of Raksha Bandhan.

A total of 35 people mostly pilgrims have died during the on-going yatra till now excluding 15 pilgrims, who died in the flashfloods at the cave shrine on July 1.

MeT department has forecast intermittent light to moderate rain with isolated heavy falls on Jammu- Banihal axis for the next three hours.

Moderate to heavy rain is likely to continue for next two to three hours on Batote-Banihal axis that may lead to landslide, mudslide, flash flood at vulnerable places, said a MeT official.