Mughal Road closed after snowfall in JK

The Mughal Road, connecting the twin districts of Poonch and Rajouri in Jammu region with South Kashmir's Shopian district, was closed for vehicular traffic today after snowfall in the high altitude areas including Pir Ki Gali, a traffic police official said.

The Mughal Road was opened for one-way traffic on March 31 after remaining closed for over four months during the winter but inclement weather last week again forced its brief closure and saw a rescue operation jointly carried out by the police and the Army during which 300 stranded passengers were evacuated to safety.

The road was closed for vehicular traffic as a precautionary measure due to snowfall in Pir Ki Gali and heavy rains in other sectors, the official said.

He said commuters had been directed to avoid avalanche-prone areas along the road to avoid any untoward incident.

The traffic on the road is plying alternatively from Poonch and Shopian districts and Shopian-bound vehicles left Bufliaz this morning as part of a one-way arrangement, the official said.

Meanwhile, the official said traffic on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway was going on smoothly despite rains.

Light motor vehicles are moving from both sides on nearly 300-km highway, the only all-weather road linking Kashmir with the rest of the country, while heavy vehicles were allowed to move from Srinagar to Jammu this morning.

The movement of heavy vehicles was restricted to one-way owing to overall condition of the road, especially between Jawahar Tunnel and Ramban, coupled with narrow width of the highway at some places owing to the ongoing widening and upgrading work.

Meanwhile, the weather office has predicted wet weather in Jammu and Kashmir during the next couple of days. "Fairly widespread rain is expected till tomorrow followed by scattered rain and thundershowers during the next three days," a spokesman of the MeT office said.

Several parts of Jammu and Kashmir including the twin capital cities of Jammu and Srinagar experienced light to moderate rains during the day today, resulting in appreciable drop in the mercury.