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Posted by Harsh Nevatia Jun 19, 2008 |
I had mentioned in my last blog that too many people are visiting Amarnath and this will spell doom for the shrine. I was referring to the ecology but even the logistics are becoming unmanageable. There are two routes for the shrine – one from Baltal and the other from Pahalgam. Each route can cater to a maximum of 6,000 pilgrims a day. Some news channels reported that there were over 36,000 devotees on the opening day itself. When the army, which manages the logistics, tried to release only 6,000 persons from the camp at Baltal the assembled pilgrims almost twice that number created a furor and forced their way to Amarnath. There are reports of over 25,000 pilgrims assembling at the shrine daily. The living and food arrangements have been made for a throughput of 6,000 and there have been reports of pilgrims going hungry. There have also been reports of some of the pilgrims being physically unfit for the arduous journey. After the stampede the army has been able to halt the Yatra at the various camps in order to ensure that only 6,000 pilgrims leave from Pahalgam and Baltal.
Meanwhile the Shrine Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) that manages the shrine has denied that there has been a stampede. They have stated that only one person has died and that too of cardiac arrest. It is difficult to believe that over half a dozen news channels have got it wrong, unless they are cutting and pasting news from each other’s web sites.
Let us not forget that this Yatra is extremely sensitive to terrorist attack as well. And above all let us hope that sense will prevail before a major untoward incident takes place.