The official engaged with local residents and held detailed interactions with rescue personnel and civil administration teams, besides evaluating the immediate requirements of the affected families to ensure the timely delivery of relief measures.The Principal Secretary underscored the need for a swift, coordinated and sustained response from all departments and agencies concerned to maximise rescue outcomes and accelerate relief and rehabilitation efforts.The flash-floods triggered by the cloudburst left a trail of destruction, flattening a makeshift market, a langar site for the annual Machail Mata yatra, damaging 16 houses and government buildings, three temples, four water mills, a 30-metre-long bridge, besides over a dozen vehicles.The joint teams of police, army, National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), CISF, Border Roads Organisation (BRO), civil administration, and local volunteers are engaged in the rescue efforts.Army engineers on Sunday built a Bailey bridge over Chisoti nullah, providing much-needed connectivity to the village and the Machail Mata shrine. The Army has also inducted a couple of all-terrain vehicles as part of the efforts to intensify the rescue and relief operation.The rescuers also conducted over half a dozen controlled explosions to blow up giant boulders hampering the search.The annual Machail Mata yatra, which began on July 25 and was scheduled to conclude on September 5, remained suspended for the seventh consecutive day on Wednesday. However, authorities will allow a group of devotees carrying ‘Charri’ from Jammu and is expected to reach the shrine on August 21 or 22.The 8.5-km trek to the 9,500-foot-high shrine starts from Chisoti, located about 90 km from Kishtwar town.
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