J-K Guv reviews Amarnath Yatra preparations

Srinagar, May 11:

Governor NN Vohra on Friday held a high-level meeting to review and discuss the security and access control related arrangements for

scheduled to begin June 28.

The Governor, who is also the chairman of the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board, stressed the need to effectively maintain close coordination among the functionaries of all the concerned agencies for ensuring that all the required security related arrangements are put in position in time, an official spokesperson said.

"Governor emphasised the need to maintain close coordination among all agencies and departments to ensure an incident free yatra and asked the Principal Secretary Home and Divisional Commissioner to undertake regular periodic reviews of the arrangements being made for the yatra," the spokesperson said.

The meeting was attended by the top brass of civil and security officials. Principal Secretary to the Governor and Chief Executive Officer, SASB, Navin K Choudhary, Divisional Commissioner, Kashmir, Shailendra Kumar, IG, BSF, Kashmir P S Sandhu, also attended the meeting – first after the opening of Raj Bhavan here as part of bi-annual Darbar Move, the spokesperson said.

The Governor directed DGP and divisional administration to put effective regulatory mechanisms in place to ensure that only those yatris who possessed valid yatra permits were allowed to undertake the pilgrimage on the date and by the route for which they had procured the permits.

Vohra instructed the Divisional Commissioner, Kashmir, to undertake a thorough review of all required arrangements to promptly meet any arising disaster situation and evolve a detailed Standard Operating Procedure which would be followed by all stakeholders, including the district administration and security forces.

The meeting was informed that a total of 7,500 pilgrims would be allowed per day per route and, as per the decision, no unregistered pilgrims would be allowed to cross the Access Control Gates, the spokesperson said.

PTI