Last ditch efforts were today on to evacuate about 900 people from Badrinath amid overcast conditions at some places in Uttarakhand where authorities were grappling with the task of extricating the bodies from the tonnes of debris lying in Kedarghati and getting them cremated.
Despite bad weather at places including Dehradun, chopper operations began this morning in Chamoli district to evacuate about 300 pilgrims and 600 locals from Badrinath shrine to Joshimath from where they will be brought further down by road.
According to latest official figures, approximately 3,000 persons have been reported missing after the tragedy.
The Chief Secretaries of the States concerned have been asked to verify the list and if the lost people are not traced in a month, they will be declared dead.
On the 16th day of the calamity today, only 36 bodies have so far been disposed of amid necessary rituals in the worst-hit Kedarnath shrine area with no cremation having taken place there over the past two days, officials said.
Ritual cremation
The State Government has sent a 200-member team of medical experts, trained police personnel and support staff from the municipal corporation to the valley to perform the onerous task of extricating the bodies and their ritual cremation.
Some of the medical experts, who had been sent to Kedarnath to take the DNA samples of the bodies there, have returned after falling sick.
With human bodies lying all over the area, the air is thick with a foul smell making it difficult for those sent to clear the debris.
“The frequently changing weather with intermittent rains is another hurdle. We are going about the cremation process slowly,” DIG Sanjay Gunjyal, who is supervising the exercise, told PTI over phone.
Despite the odds being faced by the administration in transporting relief material to the affected people with around 50 per cent of the roads still damaged, free of cost foodgrains and other essential commodities are being provided to the affected villages cut-off from the roads in helicopters, said an official statement.