The administration has taken a big step in the direction of providing better facilities to the devotees coming for the annual pilgrimage of Shri Amarnath-202 which is going to start from 30th June this year. Devotees coming from India and abroad will be able to get Panchtarni helicopter facility directly from Srinagar. Lt Governor Manoj Sinha on Thursday inaugurated the online ticket booking portal and started the helicopter service.
As earlier there was helicopter service only from Baltal and Nunwan Pahalgam to Panchtarni. The holy cave is at a distance of six kilometers from here. Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha said that there was a long standing demand of the pilgrims that there should be helicopter service from Srinagar as well. Now the devotees will be able to return on a single day after performing a pilgrimage to the holy cave. By availing the facility of online booking portal, devotees will be able to book their tickets easily.
The distance from the traditional Pahalgam route to the holy cave of Shri Amarnath is around 30 kms while from Baltal it is only about 15 kms. Now after the introduction of helicopter facility between Srinagar to Panchtarni, now devotees will be able to return to Srinagar after seeing Baba Barfani in a single day. The officials hoped that more and more devotees would take advantage of it.