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| Amarnath yatris exposed to health risk on Jammu waysides | | |  Kunal Shrivatsa
Early Times Report
JAMMU, July 7: The 'hot pursuit' for getting current registration has become a herculean task for hundreds of unregistered pilgrims as quite a lot of them are running from pillar to post for obtaining the 'prized possession' of a yatra permit and medical certificate even after making several rounds of the registration counters for days in a stretch but to no avail.
If the process of current registration is bringing troubles for the yatris, the manner in which a large number of pilgrims who have been putting up in various Dharamshalas in the old city are wittingly or unwittingly eating food, which otherwise is not fit for human consumption as the same is being cooked and consumed in the middle of Maharaja Hari Singh Park where piles of rubbish and dust rule the roost.
On one hand, the wait to get a yatra permit as well as fitness certificate is getting elongated with each passing day, on the other, many innocent yatris have been forced to cook and eat their food under unhygienic conditions thereby inviting health hazards for them.
When asked by this scribe as to why they are cooking the food in open and that too amidst unclean surroundings of Maharaja Hari Singh Park just opposite the Early Times office, pat came the reply from one of the pilgrims Ashok Bhai Rathod from Jamnagar, Gujarat, "We have no other option but to prepare the eatables in such untidy place as the Dharamshala near Raghunath Mandir, where we are staying, doesn't allow us to cook food inside the premises".
"We are also aware that the place where we are cooking food is surrounded by garbage, has layers of dust which comes off the surface whenever the wind blows and logged water on the adjacent road adds more to the insanitary conditions of the area," said Rathod adding, "Moreover, since our vehicles are parked inside the Maharaja Hari Singh Park and we have kept our ration inside them as we cannot carry it to where we are staying because of that we have no other option but to prepare and consume the food inside the park itself," he added.
However, the tedious process of current registration to a larger extent can also be attributed to the yatris strolling, satiating appetite and even staying inside Maharaja Hari Singh Park filled with dirt all around just for the sake of getting yatra permits as early as possible since reaching the counter established for the purpose at Jammu Haat is quite easy for them. |
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