The BJP on Wednesday criticized the decision to curtail the duration of Amarnath Yatra and urged
the Government to restore the pilgrimage to three to four months as done in the past to enable more
people to visit the holy shrine.Raising this issue in the RajyaSabha, Leader of Opposition Arun
Jaitley said the pilgrims and local Kashmir is were not in favour of reducing either the duration of the yatra or number of pilgrims. However, the yatra period wasreduced this year due to pressure from a ‘small section of separatists’, he said. Jaitley’s colleagues, including MVenkaiah Naidu and Najma
Heptulla, then demanded a reply from the Government. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is
also leader of the House, and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee were
present in the Rajya Sabha during the zero hour. As there was no response,
the BJP members raised a din and He ptulla said since the issue was raised by Leader of Opposition, the
Leader of the House should respond. PJ Kurien, who was in the chair, however, said he could not direct the Government to reply to an issue raised during Zero Hour. How ever,he said he had no objection if
Government wished to respond. Earlier, Jaitley said he wanted to draw the attention of the Government to a “systematic pattern”in the last five years to reduce the yatra period. Stating that the yatra used to take place over a period of four years in 1950 with 30 to40 pilgrims visiting the shrine very day, Jaitley said the duration was reduced to 55 days in 2010, 45days last year and this year number of days were cut down further even though the number of pilgrims had increased over the years.“I would urge the Government to reconsider this fact and restore the original duration of the yatra,” Jaitley said pointing out that Nitish Sengupta Committee had recommended that not more than 20,000pilgrims should be allowed to visit the shrine daily. He said that reducing the period of the yatra means the pressure will be to send more people to the shrine in a day.
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