JAMMU, June 3: Nearly 300 activists of the right-wing Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) were detained in the State’s winter capital Jammu on Sunday when they attempted to begin the pilgrimage to the Amarnath cave in Kashmir valley, which is scheduled to commence on June 25.
The date has been fixed by Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB), the organisers of the pilgrimage.
The pilgrimage is scheduled to start from June 25 and will last for a period of 39 days till August 2.
However members of the VHP want the period to be extended for 60 days.
In a move to pre-empt any bid to start the pilgrimage early on, authorities had imposed prohibitory orders in Jammu, banning assembly of five or more people (Section 144 of CRPC), a police official told reporters.
Led by the Jammu unit chief of VHP, Rama Kant Dubey, activists tried to breach the police cordon to proceed towards the Amarnath cave shrine in South Kashmir.
Meanwhile a spokesperson of SASB informed that the route to the shrine was still buried under deep snow.
“The government would not risk lives of pilgrims by allowing them to proceed under hostile weather conditions,” he said.
He added that Governor NN Vohra, who heads SASB, conducted an aerial survey of the area on Friday and found that the mouth of the cave shrine continued to be blocked by heavy snow.
