Ahead of the start of the Amarnath yatra from Jammu base camp on June 27, the security forces have been kept in a State of high alert to ensure incident free yatra this year.

Elaborate security arrangements have been made along the National Highway starting from Lakhanpur to two base camps in Kashmir valley— Baltal and Pahalgam.

The most crucial portion along the route in Jammu region is the under construction stretch between Udhampur and Chenani.

The 30 km long patch is dotted with private hotels, eating points and large scale construction activity is going on.

Keeping a close watch and screening miscreants is a challenging task for the jawans of the security forces deployed in the region.

In August 2015 a convoy of the security forces were targeted by terrorists near Samroli during the yatra period.

Inspector General of Jammu and Kashmir police, Jammu range Dr SDS Jamwal Monday visited the national highway and took stock of the security arrangements on ground zero.

In a statement police spokesman said, “the main aim of the visit was to conduct on the spot review of the security arrangements planned by the district SSP’s concerned for smooth and incident free conduct of two-month long yatra”.

Police spokesman said during the security review, threadbare discussions were held on various elements of security at different places of deployment i.e langar security, lodgment centers security, route deployment, ROP and area domination, etc from Udhampur to Jawahar Tunnel.

“IGP advised them to maintain utmost alertness to thwart the nefarious designs of anti national elements and their mentors across the border.

He also called upon the supervisory officers to ensure that manpower so earmarked for such important duties be personally briefed by them regarding nature and important of duties to be performed by them in the hilly terrain areas of twin districts.

Courtesy: The Pioneer, Tuesday, 26 June 2018 | Mohit Kandhari | Jammu