Cong demands airlifting of Kashmir-bound stranded passengers
Srinagar:The 300-km long Jammu-Srinagar Natio-nal Highway, the only surface link connecting Kashmir Valley with the rest of the country, continued to remain closed for the fourth consecutive day today following landslides trig-gered by heavy rain in the area.
“The national highway is closed for traffic and the road is being cleared of the debris due to the landslides at some places,” a Traffic Depart-ment spokesman said here. He said, the heavy rains and snowfall on Monday caused landslides at some places which forced the closure of the road. “Landslides have occurred at Gumroo in Banihal and other places which led to the closure of the highway,” he said.
Authorities are involved in relief work including clearing the debri from the road and a decision to open the highway would be taken later, official said. Mean-while, the Meteorological Department has said, the weather would be freaky for one another week with increased precipitation from March 8. The department predicted light rains or snow at some places in the plains with heavy falls in the higher reaches.
As hundreds of stranded Kashmir-bound passengers held protests here on Friday, state Congress leaders today helped them with food and demanded that the government make arrangements to airlift them to the Valley immediately.
Led by newly-appointed Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Com-mittee (JKPCC) President Gulam Ahmed Mir, the Congress leaders including MLAs visited the Jammu bus stand on Friday and saw the miserable condition of passengers, who have been stranded at bus stand for the past over six days.
“We demand immediate airlifting of the passengers of Kashmir to the Valley, particularly those with illness and elderly, who are miserable suffering due to failure of the state government to come to their help,” Mir told reporters.
“Some people parti-cularly children and women are ill and some do not have money to eat food as they are mostly poor,” he said.(PTI)