Jammu, Apr 25: The upcoming Amarnath Yatra is heading towards a big controversy as several groups Monday announced to start the pilgrimage from June 15, instead of June 29, the scheduled date announced by Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB).
 Shri Baba Amarnath Yatri Niyas-an amalgam of over 30 religious, social and trade organisations, alleged that the Board was not serious to ‘reconsider and rectify’ the decision on curtailing Amarnath Yatra period by 15 days.
 “The Yatra traditionally and annually commences on Jaishta Purnima which is falling on June 15 and ends on August 13-on Rakshabandan. The SASB was not serious to start Amarnath Yatra from June 15, instead of June 29. It, instead of making arrangements for starting the pilgrimage from auspicious Jaishta Purnima, had been issuing various statements to mislead the general public,” president of the Niyas Surinder Mohan Aggarwal told reporters here.
 He disclosed that all the constituents of the Niyas that met on April 23, have unanimously passed the resolution to start this year’s Amarnath Yatra from June 15.
 Aggarwal said, “The Niyas had shown its concern over the decision of Board to curtail Yatra and registered the protest of public by collecting their signatures through a signature campaign. Niyas collected over 3, 30, 000 signatures and submitted these to the Governor N N Vohra through his principal secretary RK Goyal, also the CEO of SASB.”
 He maintained that the Niyas had asked the SASB to reconsider their decision of reducing the duration of Yatra while keeping in consideration the sentiments of the Hindu community before April 23 and had also told the CEO that if their request was not taken seriously, Nyas would decide future course of action on April 23.
 While taking dig at recent statement of SASB in which they have quoted the reference of the Nitesh Sen Gupta committee report, which has recommended the duration of yatra should be around 30 days, Aggarwal alleged, “Whenever SASB is in trouble they always try to misled the people by making the reference and recommendations of the committee which was constituted 15 years back.”
 He added that Niyas with the support of the associate member organisations would make all the necessary arrangements required for starting the yatra as SSAB has shown its “helplessness” in starting Yatra from June 15.
 He informed, “Niyas in its meeting has decided to form the committees up to block level and has also decided to open its registration offices for making the registration of the pilgrims for this yatra upto Tehsil level. The process of forming these committees will start from April 2 and last upto April 30 and registration of the Yatra at various registration centres will start from May 1.”
 On April 19, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) had threatened to commence the pilgrimage from June 15 if the Governor, who is the chairman of SASB, failed to ‘rectify’ the decision.
 The SASB headed by the Governor as its Chairman had announced that the yatra would commence from June 29 instead of its commencement timing as per the religious calendar of Jaishta Purnima which falls on June 15.
 The Board (SASB) had defended its decision to curtail the annual Amarnath Yatra by 15 days saying the step was taken to ensure safe and smooth conduct of the arduous pilgrimage. During the 1996 Yatra, 243 pilgrims had lost their lives due to an unforeseen climatic catastrophe.
 “Another important factor relating to the duration of the Yatra is the trend among the Yatris to complete their pilgrimage within the first 25-30 days. Past experiences have shown that it is not practical to initially fix an early date for the commencement of the Yatra and then alter it because of bad weather conditions,” the Board had said.

Lastupdate on : Mon, 25 Apr 2011 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Mon, 25 Apr 2011 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:00:00 IST