Throngs of pilgrims expected to increase with all Char Dham shrines now open
Sunday, 08 May | PNS | Dehradun/Joshimath
The portals of Badrinath shrine will be opened to the public for the summer today. With this, all the Char Dham shrines in Uttarakhand will be open and the pilgrimage will be undertaken in full swing. On Saturday, the palanquins of Uddhav, Kuber along with the seat of Shankaracharya and the Gadu Ghada reached Badrinath from Pandukeshwar to the accompaniment of an army band. The procession was welcomed by thousands of devotees. Meanwhile, the Badrinath temple and complex have been decorated with more than 15 quintals of flowers for the reopening of the shrine on Sunday morning. The Badrinath Kedarnath temple committee media in-charge Harish Gaur said that all preparations have been completed for the ritual opening of the shrine. The portals of Badrinath temple will be opened for the summer at 6:15 AM.
According to official sources, a total of 13,600 pilgrims paid obeisance at the shrines of Gangotri and Yamunotri on May 6 while more than 23,000 pilgrims visited Kedarnath on the same day that was also the day of opening of Kedarnath shrine to the public. So far more than eight lakh registrations of Char Dham pilgrims have taken place. Uttarakhand expects a record footfall this year as the last two years of the Yatra had been affected by the Covid pandemic.
The State’s Tourism and Culture minister Satpal Maharaj said that all efforts have been undertaken to ensure best of facilities for the pilgrims. He said that coordination has been established among the police, health, transport and district administration for ensuring smooth conduct of the Yatra.
The State’s Tourism secretary Dilip Jawalkar informed that two mobile phone applications and one portal have been created in order to facilitate registrations of Char Dham pilgrims. Besides online registration, offline registrations are also being done.
Coordination with the Transport department has been set up and Tourist Safety Management Systems at the control room are getting all vehicle details as part of vehicle tracking mechanism. Further, grievances received at call centre 1364 are being forwarded to the department concerned for redressal, said the officials.
