Hotel & Restaurant Association Katra (HRAK) and Hotel & Restaurant Association Patnitop (HRAP) have jointly resented the highway restrictions saying it has effected the VaishnodeviYatra.
A statement said that a joint meeting under the chairmanshipof RakeshWazir President, ShyamLalKesar chairman HRAK, KushalMagotra PresidentPHRA was held here today and the decision to impose restrictions on highway wasopposed saying it effected the VaishnodeviYatra in a big way.
Wazir said it was really surprising that AmarnathYatra isgoing on since decades and not even a single incident happened in all theseyears particulary in the peaceful areas from Jammu to Udhampur.
“Despite knowing it all the government has put the pilgrims of Vaishnodevi and people toinconvenience as pilgrims in large number have missed their trains and planesand has disturbed the normal flow of Yatra in a big way and is giving bad nameto the administration.”
He said that how the Governor administration can ignoreVaishnodeviYatra which has more than 35,000 to 40,000 pilgrims per day on anaverage per day on the name of another Yatra.
Questioning the decision, Kesar said “Our efficiency isreflected from the fact that pilgrimage to Vaishnodevi which should haveincreased in last 6-7 years has reduced which can be seen from the fact thatpilgrimage of Vaishnodevi was more than 104.96 Lakh in 2012 and got reduceddown to 78.03 lac in 2014 and was still struggling on the same numbers but inlast two years when this number starting picking up a little we have thisdecision of highway restrictions.”
Magotra said that “we are crying since long that thesetypes of decisions have already brought down the tourism of Patnitop,Bhaderwah, Sanasar and other places to zero as tourist vehicles have beenstopped.”
The meeting among others was attended by HRAK seniorvice-president VirenderKesar, Vice Presidents Ajay Kotwal, Vivek Sharma,Nishant Sharma, MeenaWazir, SumitKhajuria, SecretariesSudershanSharma,MohitDubey etc.