Amarnath Yatra suspended from Jammu as rain hampers highway restoration
Both sides of NH44 were shut to traffic on Friday shortly after passage of Amarnath Yatra convoy to repair damage caused by rain
Amarnath Yatra was suspended from the Bhagwati Nagar base camp here on Saturday as the 250-km strategic Jammu-Srinagar National Highway remained closed for the second consecutive day, due to incessant rain, officials said.
No fresh batch of pilgrims was allowed to leave the Jammu base camp for the Kashmir Valley due to repair work underway on the Ladha-Samroli stretch of the highway in Udhampur district, they said.
Both sides of the highway (NH44), the only all-weather road linking the Kashmir Valley with the rest of the country, were shut to traffic on Friday shortly after the passage of the Amarnath Yatra convoy to repair the damage caused by rain last week.
Fresh spells of rain have since disrupted the operations, leaving the road surface slushy, muddy and extremely slippery.
Light to moderate rainfall have been witnessed across parts of Ramban and Udhampur districts.
Meanwhile, the Shri Amarnath Ji Shrine Board (SASB) shifted the Yatra registration and token distribution counters from the Tawi Riverfront to the Bhagwati Nagar base camp following a decline in the number of pilgrims coming to Jammu.
The Tawi Riverfront had been developed as a centralised mega-facility for offline registration, token distribution, e-KYC verification and RFID issuance for Amarnath pilgrims.
With the pilgrim influx tapering off, the registration facilities have now been consolidated at the Bhagwati Nagar base camp, the officials said.
Since July 3, when the yatra began, around 4.5 lakh devotees have so far visited the cave shrine housing the naturally formed ice lingam in south Kashmir Himalayas.
The yatra is scheduled to conclude on August 28 that coincides with Raksha Bandhan.
