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The Shri Mata Vaishno Devi yatra has been suspended due to a landslide and heavy rainfall. Thirty people have lost their lives in the landslide near the shrine at Ardhkuwari in Jammu and Kashmir's Reasi on Tuesday.
Several devotees said the situation was chaotic following the landslide. "I am from Banaras. The landslides started happening at the Garbh Joon Gufa temple (Ardhkuwari)... The situation was chaotic... People started coming downwards via the Tarakote marg... The ambulances were running to and fro quickly... The yatra has been halted. The returnees are coming down via the Tarakote marg," a devotee at Vaishno Devi, Katra, Satish Kumar told ANI. "I am from Amritsar. I don't know where the people are who were with me. I have been looking for them since yesterday. There were five people with me. Since I am unable to find or contact them, I assume they might be injured... I don't know anything about any hospital here since I am not from here," Sunny Giri, another devotee, said. Several devotees to the Vaishno Devi shrine in Katra, Jammu and Kashmir, were left stranded after train cancellations due to the landslide. Speaking to ANI, Rajkumari Devi, a devotee from Bihar, said, "I am from Motihari, Bihar. We have here a day before yesterday. We had the 'Darshan'. Now, we want to go home, but we are not able to as the trains are cancelled. A huge mishap has occurred. We are scared and want to go home." "I am from Champaran, Bihar... The trains have shut down. We are facing issues with reaching Bihar. We heard that a huge mishap had happened after we had 'Darshan' and returned... We are trapped here due to the rain... We had tickets, but the trains have shut down," another devotee said. Chief Minister Omar Abdullah stated on Wednesday that Jammu and Kashmir is still struggling with almost nonexistent communication, as the Union Territory reels from the damage caused by heavy rain. "Still struggling with almost nonexistent communication. There is a trickle of data flowing on Jio mobile, but no fixed line WiFi, no browsing, almost no apps, things like X open frustratingly slowly, WhatsApp struggles with anything more than short text messages. Haven't felt this disconnected since the terrible days of 2014 & 2019," the Chief Minister said in a post on X. (ANI)
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