Snow brings life to halt in Jammu & Kashmir

The incessant rains and snow have led to power supply being disrupted and roads being blocked.

Heavy snowfall paralysed life in the Kashmir Valley on Tuesday with exams being postponed, educational institutions closed, power supply disrupted and land and air connections to the rest of the country cut off.

HT Image

The summer capital Srinagar recorded an unprecedented two feet of snow on Tuesday morning. Similar reports came in from other parts with five to six feet of snow in Pahalgam and Gulmarg and more than seven feet in Sonamarg.

The incessant rains and snow have led to power supply being disrupted and roads being blocked. All educational institutions, including schools, colleges and universities, have been closed in Srinagar for two days and all scheduled exams and interviews postponed.

Land and air connections between the Valley and the rest of the country have been cut off — the Srinagar-Jammu highway remained closed for the second day on Tuesday. And no domestic airlines could operate flights to the Valley because of heavy snowfall and poor visibility on Monday.

"We are trying to restore electricity at some places by this afternoon provided the snowfall stops," said Khwaja Nisar Hussain, chief engineer electric maintenance, Kashmir.

All inter-district transport has also been closed, as the administration is yet to deploy snow clearance machines to clear the roads.

"We are trying to remove snow from the major roads of the city as a priority. Instructions have already been passed to the concerned district magistrates to have the inter-district roads cleared as soon as possible," said a senior divisional administrative officer.

The weatherman has predicted no respite from wet weather for the next 48 hours.

"The present weather conditions are likely to continue for another two days as the Westerly disturbances responsible for these are still holding," said an officer of the weather department in Srinagar.