Historic Mughal road and Srinagar-Jammu highway, the only road link connecting Kashmir Valley with outside world, were closed as heavy rains lashed plains and upper reaches accumulated fresh snow across Kashmir Valley on Wednesday.Official sources said heavy rains triggered landslides at a few place along the 300-kilomter highway particularly in Gamroo area of mountainous Ramban district, forcing the authorities to close the traffic on the important thoroughfare on Wednesday evening.They said 1 to 1.5 feet of fresh snow accumulated on Simpthan top and Peergali, leading the closure of historic Mughal road, linking Shopian in south Kashmir with Rajouri and Poonch in Jammu region, for traffic.Gulmarg’s Affarwat recorded around one feet of snow while Zabarwan mountains rains in Srinagar had light snowfall, they said.
An official of the local meteorological department here told GNS that as predicted, there were rains in plains with Kupwara in north Kashmir recording highest downpour of 27.2 mm during the day. The frontier district recorded a day temperature of 7.7 degree Celsius, almost 13 degrees Celsius than the normal temperature for this time of the year.Srinagar, the summer capital of the state, recorded 13.4 degrees Celsius, six degrees below actual while it had a rainfall of 12.8 mm since morning, the official added.Qazigund, the gateway town to Kashmir, recorded a maximum temperature of 12.7 degrees Celsius while Pahalgam tourist resort had 6.4 degree Celsius and adjoining Kokernag had maximum of 10.6 degrees Celsius. Pahalgam had a rainfall of 21.0 mm, Kokernag received 16.8 mm while as Qazigund received 17.6, the official said.The weather office here has already issued fresh prediction of rains in plains and snowfall over the higher reaches till Thursday in the state.“We are expecting snow and rains at different places in Jammu and Kashmir in next 24-hour,” the weatherman said. (GNS)