Srinagar , June 2
For Ajay Kumar and his seven colleagues from New Delhi visiting Kashmir, it has been a difficult time since Monday morning with the beginning of the general strike against the death of two women in the Shopian area of south Kashmir. The group, on a week-long tour to the valley, is waiting in a hotel room here for their scheduled departure tomorrow, without having been able to visit many places during the past two days.

“We left Pahalgam at 4 am on Monday for Gulmarg so as to avoid any trouble on the way during day time,” Ajay Kumar said. His party was asked to leave as early as possible so as to reach Gulmarg via Srinagar without being ‘caught in trouble’ due to the strike and protests. Having spent the last night in Gulmarg, about 50 km north of here, the group left early morning to reach Srinagar by 8 am, before any trouble started during day time. “The hotel staff and tour operators have been taking care to ensure that we do not face any difficulty,” he pointed out. But they had not been able to visit market places along Boulevard here and may return without shopping in Kashmir.

Hotel Broadway here has been getting calls from tourists for the cancellation of bookings since yesterday after the trouble began. Tourists are beginning to get stranded in hotels here or at Gulmarg and Pahalgam. “If the trouble continues, there will definitely be an adverse impact,” said Habibullah of Grand Mumtaz hotel, where the occupancy rate has already borne the impact of the strike.

Chief Minister Omar Abdullah here yesterday lamented that the frequent strike calls given by some groups would affect education, as well as tourism in the state. “If strikes continue, this season will also be lost,” the Chief Minister feared. While 3,800 tourists arrived on Saturday, their number declined to 2,600 on Sunday, which may further go down if the trouble continued, he said.