No Respite for Residents As Met Office Predicts More Snow

Srinagar: Although Tuesday morning greeted valley people with a pleasant sunshine, but the overnight open skies, inducing a considerable dip in the temperature below the freezing point resulted in freezing of taps and water pipes, while roads turned slippery.

Meanwhile in upper reaches of Kulgam district, including Qazi Gund and Jawahar Tunnel area there was not let up in the snowfall throughout the day on Tuesday.

Srinagar received eight to ten inches of snow, where the day long snowfall without a let up created a havoc on roads as vehicles became difficult for the drives to control, resulting in huge traffic jams in the evening.

Many commuters were forced to abandon their vehicle and walk the distance on foot, as the roads became slippery despite continuous removal of snow from roads by the workers.

Even as men and machinery was visible in many areas this time to deal with the situation, but despite their efforts much of the city remained waterlogged hampering the normal public movement.

Till Tuesday afternoon authorities were unable to achieve any success to drain out the water and many low lying areas remained submerged.  People preferred to stay back home, while those who came out had to wade through ankle deep water.

City’s two major thoroughfares the Residency and Maulana Azad roads remained partially submerged.

Upper reaches of Kupwara received the maximum snowfall, resulting in the closure of Kupwara-Karnah road.

Sadhna Top in Karnah Tehsil of Tangdhar in Kupwara district recorded about three feet of snow, while as low lying areas in the region received up-to one and a half feet.

Due to the unprecedented snowfall in the region, Karnah and Tangdhar area remained cut off from the district head quarter Kupwara, since the road remained closed for a third consecutive day on Tuesday.

Upper reaches of valley including Gulmarg and whole Peerpanchal region witnessed medium to heavy snowfall during the period, while authorities did not withdraw avalanche warning issued on Monday, given to the heavy snowfall in these areas.

In Budgam district all the link roads remained blocked with snow till Tuesday evening, as there was no effort visible from the administration towards removing of snow from these link roads. In Tangmarg area several houses are reported to have suffered damage to the heavy snowfall.

In Kangan area of Ganderbal district people said that no snow clearance operation was conducted by the administration, resulting in difficulty to vehicular movement on Kangan Sonmarg highway.

Officials from beacon said that their men and machinery is occupied with snow clearance in the upper reaches, where situation is more critical, while the officials from Roads and Buildings (R&B) department said that they have only one JCB and they are doing whatever they can with that one JCB.

Meanwhile Qazigund in South received 24inches of snow, resulting in the closure of Srinagar Jammu highway, which was thrown open on Monday morning at 11 for one way traffic from Srinagar to Jammu, but with no let up in the snowfall in the day highway was gain closed for the traffic.

Officials said that from Banihal to Udhampur thousands of trucks and passenger vehicles are presently stranded, waiting for the highway to open. Huge amount of snow had accumulated on the highway in Banihal region. On the other side in several areas of Ramban district landslides struck the area making the movement of vehicular traffic impossible.

Meanwhile Metrology department has predicted another two day long snowfall, beginning from 17^th January, while light to moderate rainfall at isolated places in Jammu division on Friday and Saturday.  —With inputs from CNS

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