Jammu
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| | Jammu’s prime tourist spot sans parking, basic facilities | | | JAMMU, July 17: The most popular tourist spot in Jammu region, also one of the most visited places during the long, hot summers – Patnitop is without a parking area, adding to both chaos, hampering with the pristine beauty of the place, and causing severe tension in the minds of the vehicle owning visitors.
In view of absence of a parking area, the vehicle safety of tourists becomes a remote thing. The owner of a vehicle receives only a GR slip from the Patnitop Development Authority (PDA) for its entrance without covering vehicle risk and this is already mentioned on the Slip that states, “Vehicles on their own risk.”
A vehicle owner from New Delhi, Sachin Gupta said, “This is my second visit in the state and also my first visit to Patnitop. At most of the tourist places in Srinagar, parking is not an issue. If anyone parks his vehicle outside the sight seeing place it becomes the responsibility of the concerned authority to look after the possession. But in Patnitop the onus is put on the customer.”
Another vehicle owner from Ahmadabad, Zakir said, “It is very unfortunate for a person who keeps his vehicle in the parking area and is unable to determine the exact fate of his lone possession. The reason being simple that the GR slip which is an official piece of paper clearly implies to the fact that the parking by anyone is at his own risk. When people are being asked to pay according to the type of vehicles they own, it is not known why this payment does not cover the “risk factor”.
A family from Gujurat said, “This practice is quite unexplainable for the people who go for sight seeing and to enjoy the place and still are bound by the so called risk factor. So the question arises that if there is development, does it exist? What exactly does the so called developmental fee imply to? People who come there irrespective of smiles return with unsatisfied ddue to lack of such basic facilities. The lack of such elemental contour adds to the worries of the tourists.”
When contacted, Patnitop Development Authority, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Raman Kesar said, “The PDA is only charged with development charges for the entrance of vehicles and it is not our responsibility to take care of these vehicles.”
When asked about the parking places in the area, Kesar said, “There are separate places for parking and they are exclusively for those who own vehicles and are devoid of any risk factor.”
But digging further from the sources, it was revealed that no such parking exists in the tourist spot and the vehicles are kept at the junction or the road sides of the circuit. Some hotels do offer parking places for the vehicles but for the day visitors no such facility exists.
It is not known what the developmental fee covers. People who come there for enjoying are unable to get even the basic facilities, irrespective of the fact that these facilities are the base for any spot development like no public urinals, shortage of drinking water facilities and others. |
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| ‘Militant’ killed in Handwara encounter | | SRINAGAR, Jul 17: An unidentified ‘militant’ was killed in the wee hours today in an encounter with police and army at Batsunjhi in Handwara area of north Kashmir’s Kupwara district, police said.
The militant, according to the police, was hiding in the forest near Jaba in the village. On a tip off, the police and army started a search operation overnight, resulting in a gunfight that ended at 9 AM with death of the ‘militant’.
“On receiving the information, the police and 6 RR jointly launch | | > Govt dismisses KAS officer for graft | | > 16-years on, son wants to see father’s grave | | > Laila Khan case | | > Army worries over infiltrations, happy about cricketing ties | | > 2 more Amarnath pilgrims die, toll toll rises to 85 |
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