Two pilgrims die on way to Amarnath

Srinagar: Two more Amarnath pilgrims, one each from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, died of natural causes on Sunday, raising the toll to fourteen during this year’s yatra to the 3,888-feet-high revered cave-shrine in Kashmir Himalayas.

The police and hospital sources said that a 54-year-old woman pilgrim from Hyderabad, identified as Lakshmi Bhai, died due to cardiac arrest at Baltal, the base-camp at a distance of 96 kilometres from summer capital Srinagar overnight.

Another pilgrim, Ravinder Nath (72), a resident of Andhra Pradesh, was taken ill while on yatra. He was admitted to Srinagar’s Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS) where he passed away on Sunday, the sources said.

Another seriously ill pilgrim, 45-year-old Gauri Shankar of Gujarat, was immediately airlifted by the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board (SASB) from Baltal to the SKIMS for further specialised treatment.

Six of the other twelve pilgrims who died since June 28 when the annual yatra commenced from both shorter Baltal and traditional Pahalgam routes were swept by a landslide or hit by shooting stones along the 13-km track between Baltal and the cave-shrine triggered by heavy rains earlier this week.

Meanwhile, the travel by Amarnath pilgrims from winter capital Jammu was suspended for Sunday “as a precautionary measure”.