SRINAGAR : The national highway, connecting the Ladakh region with the Kashmir valley, was closed today to officialy put it through tomorrow, though one-way traffic has been plying on the 434-km-long Srinagar-Leh road for the past one week.
Meanwhile, one-way traffic continued on the highway, linking the Kashmir valley with the rest of the country and historic Mughal route, being developed as alternative to Srinagar-Jammu highway.
A traffic police official told there was no traffic on the Srinagar-Leh national highway due to maintenance of the road by Border Roads Organisation (BRO).
The highway was reopened only last week after remaining closed for five winter months due to accumulation of heavy snow on the highway at different places between Sonmarg to Meenmarg, including Zojila pass.
Reopening of the road was delayed by a week as compared to last year due to late snowfall and avalanches. Meanwhile, Brig A K Das, Chief Engineer, Project Beacon said that Zojila pass, at 108 km on Srinagar-Gumri on the highway will be formally declared open tomorrow.
He said the national highway remained open for one-way only and today traffic will play from Jammu to Srinagar. However, no vehicle will be allowed from opposite direction. If road and weather conditions improves, traffic will ply from Srinagar to Jammu tomorrow, he said. Only one-way traffic is allowed on the lifeline of Kashmir as the road was damaged due to soil erosion, landslide and shooting stones at several places. The BRO has already started repairing the road to make it two-way in view of the tourist season.
Only one-way traffic is also plying on the historic Mughal road, which reopened only last week after remaining closed during winter. Traffic is plyig from Srinagar to Jammu today, he said. The road being developed as alternative to Srinagar-Jammu national highway connects Shopian in south Kashmir to Rajouri and Poonch districts of Jammu region.
However, dozens of far-flung and remote villages, including those near the Line of Control (LoC) in the frontier district of Kupwara and north Kashmir district of Bandipora remained cut off from their respective district headquarters for the past six months due to snow. (AGENCIES)
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