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Tight security in Banihal: PM to inaugurate rail tunnel today

KT NEWS SERVICE. Dated: 6/25/2013 11:22:50 PM

JAMMU, June 25: As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi are scheduled to inaugurate 11-kilometer long rail tunnel between Banihal-Qazigund at Banihal tomorrow, tight security arrangements have been put in place at the venue i.e. Railway Station Banihal.
The whole venue and its suburbs have been thrown out of bound for civilians and it has been virtually converted into fortress. The vehicular movement in the area has been restricted while sharp shooters have been deployed at all sensitive points around the venue with three tier-security setup including that of police, RPF and CRPF.
Additional deployment has been made with backup of Quick Reaction Teams (QRTs) at Banihal Railway Station. The venue has been thoroughly frisked using metal detectors. Sniffer dogs were also pressed into service and the whole area has been sanitized manually by the security forces. Security has also been strengthened along the Jammu-Srinagar National Highway.
Singh and Gandhi will jointly flag off the first train at around 11.50 AM on the 18-km-long section between Banihal in Jammu and Qazigund in Kashmir, marking the start of the rail service to the Valley.
The 8-coach train will make regular operation from Banihal to Baramulla from June 27 after the inaugural run on June 26. The Banihal-Baramulla-Banihal train will make five trips daily beginning at 7.10 AM from Banihal and 7.35 AM from Baramulla.
Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge, Governor NN Vohra and Chief Minister Omar Abdullah along with other central ministers Farooq Abdullah and Ghulam Nabi Azad are expected to be present on the historic occasion.
"We have seven pairs of trains to run between Banihal and Baramulla. Earlier there were five rakes only but now it has been increased," said a senior Northern railway official.
The Banihal-Qazigund section, which includes an 11-km-long tunnel, will reduce the distance from 35 km (by road) to 18 km. It has been constructed at a cost of Rs 1,691 crore. This rail section is very significant, as it will provide an all-weather link to Kashmir Valley that often gets cut off from the rest of the country due to snowfall during winters.
Meanwhile, with the first batch of the Amarnath Yatra scheduled to leave from the city on June 27, Police today said that they are taking "extra precautions" to ensure a safe and sound pilgrimage.
So far nearly three lakh people have registered for the annual yatra which will be flagged off from Jammu by Minister for Tourism G A Mir.
"Whatever is required from the security point of view is being done. Additional deployment has been made at Jammu Railway Station,” a senior police officer said.
With just one day left before the start of the 55 day long annual Amarnath pilgrimage the authorities here including security personnel regulating the pilgrim traffic may find it difficult to stop the minors and senior citizens of 75 years of age from accompanying their parents/children on the arduous yatra track.
Learning from its past mistakes the Shrine Board had issued strict guidelines this year disallowing all the children under 13 years of age, senior citizens above 75 years of age and women with six weeks of pregnancy not to undertake the yatra.
Ignoring all such guidelines a large number of pilgrims have started arriving here to undertake the pilgrimage. Several community halls earmarked for the Amarnath pilgrims have already started receiving pilgrims.
Surprisingly, several pilgrims have brought their minor children along with them to join the yatra without paying attention to the SASB guidelines.
When contacted the pilgrims, camping in Jammu said, "When we are coming for the yatra we cannot leave behind our children. It is up to the government and the authorities to see whether they can stop us from performing the pilgrimage because we have minor children".
The majority of the pilgrims were upbeat and were scared by the attack on the security forces in Srinagar or incidents of flash floods in Uttarakhand. We are here o perform darshan of holy Shivling inside the cave shrine of Amarnath and we are all set to join the first batch of pilgrims, head of the pilgrim group who arrived here from Allahabad said.
It may be mentioned that the age limit was fixed by the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) after deliberating on the recommendations made by the National Disaster Management Authority and Nitish K Sengupta Committee.
Last year when over 100 deaths were reported along the yatra track the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) had recommended that "no child under the age of 11 years, no person above the age of 75 years and no woman with more than six weeks' pregnancy should be allowed to undertake the pilgrimage." The yatra is scheduled to begin from June 28 and continue till August 21 this year.
According to the SASB, the fixing of age limit will help ensure that only physically fit people embark upon the arduous 55-day pilgrimage to the holy Himalayan cave shrine of Lord Shiva.