Massive landslide on Badrinath highway leaves 14,000 pilgrims stuck

May 20, 2017

Dehradun, May 20: Nearly 14,000 pilgrims were left stranded at various places in Chamoli district after a massive landslide blocked the Rishikesh-Badrinath highway on Friday afternoon.

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The landslide which occurred in Hathi Parvat near Vishnuprayag, 9-km from Joshimath, left 60 metres of the national highway damaged but there were no reports of injury to pilgrims.

Confirming that the landslide had left a large numbers of pilgrims stranded, Tripti Bhatt, superintendent of police (SP) Chamoli, told TOI, "After the landslide, at least 1,183 pilgrims were stopped in Govindghat, 900 at Joshimath and 450 at Pandukeshwar from moving ahead. They have been accommodated in nearby hotels, lodges, gurdwaras and guest houses. Around 11,000 pilgrims were at Badrinath for darshan at the time of the calamity."

While District Magistrate Ashish Joshi said that a total of 1,800 pilgrims got stuck on both sides of a 75-meter wide slide and arrangements have been made for their stay and food, adding that, "yatra has not been halted as reported by certain sections of the media."

The vehicles on their way back from Badrinath had to return to the shrine while those going to Badrinath from Vishnuprayag were forced to return to Joshimath and Govindghat, where the administration made temporary boarding and lodging arrangements for the pilgrims.

The SP said, "The hotels, ashrams and other establishments near Badrinath can house at least one lakh pilgrims so there is no cause of worry." Many vehicles at Rishikesh have also been stopped from proceeding until the highway is open to traffic again.

Deepam Seth, inspector general of police (IG) Law and Order, claimed that none of the vehicles and pilgrims remained trapped in the landslide-affected area.

Personnel from Border Roads Organization said that the landslide had brought so much debris on the road that normal traffic movement would only be restored by Saturday night.

Colonel Rama Subramanian, BRO commandant, said, "Big boulders rolled down from the mountain with a deafening thud on Friday at 2pm. There is a lot of debris on the road. It seems that it will take at least till Saturday for vehicles to be able to travel on the highway."

The BRO has pressed earthmovers into service to clear the debris, said Colonel P H Sharma, spokesperson of the BRO.

Meanwhile, Garhwal commissioner Vinod Sharma has also left for Chamoli to take stock of the situation while disaster management secretary Amit Negi is monitoring the situation from Dehradun.

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News Network
April 16,2024

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New Delhi:  Twenty-nine Maoists, including a senior rebel leader - Shankar Rao, who had a bounty of ₹ 25 lakh on his head - were killed by security forces during an encounter in Chhattisgarh's Kanker district on Tuesday afternoon. A huge quantity of weapons, including Ak-47 and INSAS rifles, were recovered. 

Three security personnel were injured in the gunfight, which took place in forests near the village of Binagunda after a joint team of District Reserve Guard and Border Security Force were attacked.

Two of the three injured are from the BSF. Their condition is stable but the third - from the DRG - is in critical care. All three received treatment at a local hospital and are to be shifted to a larger facility.

Sources said the fighting began at around 2 PM, when a joint DRG-BSF team was conducting an anti-Maoist operation. The DRG was set up in in 2008 to combat Maoist activities in the state, and the Border Security Force has been deployed extensively in the area to for counter-insurgency ops.

There was another encounter in the district last month, in which two people - a Maoist and a cop - were killed, and security forces recovered a gun, some explosives, and other incriminating materials.

Personnel from the DRG and Bastar Fighters, both units of the state police force, with the Border Security Force, were involved in that operation, officials told news agency PTI. The patrolling team was cordoning off a forested area when fired on indiscriminately, leading to the gun battle.

In November last year, while the state was voting in the first phase of an Assembly election, a gunfight broke out between security forces and Maoist rebels in the same district.

An Ak-47 rifle was recovered from the encounter site.

On the same day, while polling was taking place, Maoists fired at DRG personnel deployed near a polling station in Banda in Dantewada district.

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News Network
April 22,2024

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The BJP has opened its account in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections. The party's candidate from Gujarat's Surat constituency, Mukesh Dalal, has won the polls as all his opponents are now out of the fray.

BJP's Mukesh Dalal elected unopposed from the Surat Lok Sabha seat after all other candidates withdrew from the contest, the party's Gujarat unit chief CR Paatil said today. Today was the deadline for withdrawing nominations.

The nominations of the Congress party's Surat candidate and his substitute were rejected by the returning officer over alleged discrepancies in paperwork, a development that the Congress called an attempt at "match-fixing".

"Surat has presented the first lotus to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. I congratulate our candidate for Surat Lok Sabha seat Mukesh Dalal for getting elected unopposed," Mr Paatil posted on the microblogging website X, referring to the BJP's election symbol.

Eight candidates - seven of them independents - and Pyarelal Bharti of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) withdrew their papers.

The nomination papers of the Congress's Surat candidate Nilesh Kumbhani was rejected on Sunday after the district returning officer Saurabh Parghi found discrepancies in the signatures of the proposers.

The nomination form of Suresh Padsala, the Congress's substitute candidate from Surat, was also found invalid.

The returning officer had said the four nomination forms submitted by the two Congress candidates did not appear genuine. The proposers, in their affidavits, had said they had not signed the forms themselves, the returning officer said in the order.

Congress lawyer Babu Mangukiya said the party will approach the high court and the Supreme Court for relief.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh in a post on X said the Surat developments indicate "democracy is under threat". "Our elections, our democracy, Babasaheb Ambedkar's Constitution - all are under a generational threat. This is the most important election of our lifetime," Mr Ramesh said.

Mr Ramesh alleged the "distress" of micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME) owners and the business community in PM Modi's "Anyay Kaal" and their anger have "spooked the BJP so badly that they are attempting to match-fix the Surat Lok Sabha polls, which they have won consistently since the 1984 Lok Sabha elections."

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News Network
April 13,2024

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New Delhi: Seventeen Indians are on board an Israeli-linked container ship that has been seized by the Iranian military amid heightened tensions between Iran and Israel.

Official sources said India is in touch with Iranian authorities through diplomatic channels, both in Tehran and in Delhi, to ensure the welfare and early release of the Indian nationals.

The Iranian action came amid increasing fears that Tehran may launch an attack on Israeli soil in retaliation to a strike on the Iranian consulate in Syria 12 days ago.

"We are aware that a cargo ship 'MSC Aries' has been taken control by Iran. We have learnt that there are 17 Indian nationals onboard," said a source.

"We are in touch with the Iranian authorities through diplomatic channels, both in Tehran and in Delhi, to ensure security, welfare and early release of Indian nationals," it said.

Reports said Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards seized MSC Aries on Saturday morning when it was sailing through the Strait of Hormuz.

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