Amarnath Yatra will continue even as spike in terrorist activities in Jammu and Kashmir was discussed during a high-level meeting chaired by the union home minister Amit Shah on Friday.
Amit Shah's close door interaction with the National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval, Army Chief General Manoj Pande, the Union Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla, Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Manoj Sinha, DG of BSF Pankaj Kumar Singh and CRPF DG Kuldiep Singh, was to review the worsening security situation due to targeted killings of Kashmiri Pandits and others in the union territory.
The retailing of terror activities, due to which gun wielding terrorists are killing innocent individuals, has spread a fear leading to possible exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from the J&K, said Kashmiri Pandit association members. Before the high profile security meeting, the J&K administration had issued an order to bring vulnerable non-Muslim employees in mofussil government offices to the nearest towns for better security and safety, said UT officials.
Sources said that the Amarnath Yatra which is to commence from June 30 was also discussed in the meeting. Security officials believe that the recent spurt in killings is an attempt to counter the narrative that the J&K was progressing due to large-scale initiatives for the development of the UT. Due to normalcy, the J&K was witnessing a record tourist footfalls with hardly any vacancies in hotels. It has been a hostorical trend in the Pakistan-bordering UT, the ISI-backed terrorist outfits carry out strikes to unsettle travellers.
On Thursday, a bank employee and a brick kiln labourer were gunned down among instances of merciless killing in Kashmir. Earlier, a woman teacher belonging to Jammu's Samba district was shot dead by terrorists at a school in south Kashmir's Kulgam area. Since May 1, ten people have succumbed to targeted killings in Kashmir.