Thanks to Yamuna, Taj attracting more crowds

Thanks to the rain-swollen Yamuna, the Taj Mahal is attracting more and more visitors.

Behind the Taj, the river water has entered the artificial lawn along the foundation.

"By Monday, the green stretch artificially developed will be totally submerged," guide Ved Gautam told IANS.

The view of the Taj from the rear, the Mehtab Bagh complex, is attracting a large number of tourists.

The Yamuna continues to rise in Agra. In nearby Vrindavan, the situation is stable. In Mathura, all the sluice gates of the Gokul Barrage are open.

Irrigation department officials indicated there was not much of a possibility of a further rise. By Monday evening, the level should start receding in Agra.

The Yamuna touched the low flood danger mark of 495 feet Sunday morning. Old timers said it was perhaps the first flood in the middle of June.

Hari Mohan Shrotriya, a priest at the Sri Mathuradheesh temple on the Yamuna Kinara Road, said that in his 70 years in Agra, he had never seen so much water in the Yamuna around this time of the year.

The monsoon normally arrives in Agra around June 29.