Pilgrims flock to Vaishno Devi on fourth consecutive day

Jammu, Aug 15 (UNI) The holy cave shrine of Vaishno Devi witnessed an unprecedented rush of pilgrims on the fourth day today as nearly 40,000 pilgrims heve been offering puja and darshan here daily, official sources said today.

The Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board (SMVDB) stopped the registration at 1330 hrs on Saturday, while generally registration time is 0600 hrs to 2300 hrs daily.

The registration counter could not be opened even today because of the heavy rush on the 12 km mountainous route of the cave shrine.

''Due to heavy rush of pilgrims at Katra, Ardhkumari, Bhawan (Temple premises) and Bhaironnath, the registration counter have been closed earlier,'' official sources said.

With daily arrival of over 40,000 pilgrims at the base camp in Katra town of Udhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir, all the arrangements have collapsed and pilgrims are forced to take shelter on roads and streets.

Nearly 4.15 lakh pilgrims, till Sunday, from different parts of at the country, have visited Vaishno Devi since January registering an increase of over 4.49 lakh yatris from the corresponding period last year.

The Shrine Board has made elaborate arrangements to tackle the heavy rush as also special arrangement for sanitation and other requirements heve been made.

To regulate the rush of pilgrims, Additional SP, SDPO and SHO, Katra, are personally supervising the situation. Also, security arrangements have been tightened in and around Katra town.

UNI HGV KD PC1603