SRINAGAR : Despite intermittent rain and cloudy weather, a fresh batches of pilgrims left Baltal and Nunwan Pahalgam base camps for the holy Amarnath cave shrine at 13500 feet in south Kashmir Himalayas.
A Yatra Control Room (YCR) official told UNI that 1148 pilgrims, including women and sadhus paid obeisance at the holy cave shrine on the 41st day of the ongoing 59-day-long annual pilgrimage yesterday.
This was the lowest number of pilgrims who offer Puja at the cave shrine, he added. With this a total of 3,43,131 pilgrims have paid obeisance since the commencement of the yatra from July 2 which will conclude on August 29.
The official said fresh batches of yatris, including women and sadhus, left Nunwan Pahalgam base camp for Chandanwari, the last motorable halting station on the 45-km-long track on traditional route. Similarly pilgrims, who had night halt at Chandanwari have also started their onward journey towards the cave shrine early this morning.
Yatra Control Room official said ”fresh batches of yatris, including women, sadhus and children, left Baltal base camp early this morning for the cave shrine.” Pilgrims are scheduled to reach the cave shrine after covering the 16-km-long track on foot this afternoon.
Pigrims, who had night halt at cave shrine after paying obeisance yesterday have started their return journey towards base camps early this morning.
While, vendors who have put up their stalls at Baltal base camp expressed disappointment saying the number of pilgrims this year was low, after the cloud burst at Baltal in which five persons were killed and several others were injured, vendors also quoted that frequent closure of the national highway has badly affected the yatra this time.
Similar views were expressed by tent, pony and dandi workers as walls. (AGENCIES)
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