Avtar Bhat
JAMMU, July 8: On the seventh day of darshan, 19,911 pilgrims paid obeisance at holy cave of Swami Amarnath situated in the lap of deep Himalayas in South Kashmir district of Anantnag at an altitude of 3888 meters. With this the total number of pilgrims performing darshan of Ice Lingam in cave shrine since the two-month long Yatra started from Yatri Niwas Jammu on July 1 has touched 1,04,918.
According to an official spokesman, the Yatra rush is picking up day by day with thousands of pilgrims reporting at twin base camps of Baltal and Nunwan, Pahalgam daily from different parts of country for their onwards journey to holy cave.
He said 6806 yatris left from Baltal to holy cave this morning for darshan while 1951 pilgrims left by air to holy cave. In addition to it 6601 pilgrims left from traditional Nunwan -Pahalgam track for cave shrine this morning and the yatris stationed at Chandanwari, Sheshnag and Panchtarni also started their onwards journey early in the morning.
The spokesman said the weather enroute to holy cave on both the tracks was pleasant today.
He said one more person Baldev Raj, a Sevadar with a langer near Dumel died of cardiac arrest late last night. He was 70. He was a resident of Subash Nagar, New Delhi and was working as a Sevadar with a langer. His body was dispatched to his home State, he added.
With this death, the total number of pilgrims who died during the ongoing Yatra has touched four.
Meanwhile, Governor N N Vohra who is also the chairman of Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) today held a meeting at the Raj Bhavan, Srinagar to review arrangements for the ongoing Yatra.
P K Tripathi, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Jitendra K Singh Additional Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Board briefed the Governor about the position regarding the ongoing arrangements made by the various concerned departments and other agencies.
The CEO also submitted a detailed report to Governor. He informed Mr Vohra that arrangements regarding sanitation, water and power supply, medical units, langar, availability of essential commodities like ration and LPG, accommodation of yatris at Camps, functioning of MRTS etc had been satisfactory during the past seven days, despite some initial hiccups.
The Governor urged the CEO and Additional CEO to closely monitor the Yatra, and ensure effective coordination with all the agencies involved in the conduct of pilgrimage and ensure safety and security of the pilgrims particularly in regard to forward movement of the pilgrims from the two base camps and onwards the holy cave. The Governor stressed that CEO should halt or suspend the yatra if there is any weather forecast warning.
However in Jammu the yatris still continue to face the registration problem and today again the pilgrims staged a protest in front of Jammu Haat alleging harassment during registration. The protestors shouted slogans against the administration for poor arrangements.
The district administration has started token system at Jammu Haat registration counters also from today for the facility of pilgrims and for their hassle free registration. This was stated by Dr Piyush Singla, Additional DC Jammu who is also the Nodal Officer for the Yatra.
He said today 566 waiting list token numbers were issued to the yatris who could not get registered as the day’s quota was exhausted. To avoid problem to these pilgrims they were issued a waiting list token number and for these yatris a separate line will the started to give them priority in registration tomorrow morning, he added.
Meanwhile, a fresh batch of 1770 pilgrims left Jammu Yatri Niwas for holy cave early this morning under tight security arrangements in a cavalcade of 55 vehicles. They included 1319 male, 332 female, 19 children and 100 Sadhus. All these pilgrims have crossed Jawahar Tunnel by this evening and they were on their way to twin base camps of Nunwan and Baltal.
Follow our WhatsApp channel