Srinagar (J&K): All political parties have expressed anger against the LG administration for keeping vehicles loaded with apples from Kashmir valley to foreign states stranded on the Srinagar-Jammu highway.
Criticizing the administration, the National Conference said, "Although the traffic is moving on the highway and there is no breakdown of the highway at any point, there is no justification for stopping the apple-laden vehicles." They said that apple owners, traders, and people dependent on this industry were suffering a lot of losses.
PDP president Mehbooba Mufti said that horticulture was the backbone of Jammu and Kashmir's economy but it was being deliberately broken. She blamed the Centre and the LG administration and claimed that they want the economy of Kashmir to end and the people here to come to their knees.
People's Conference chairman Sajad Gani Lone said the stranding of fruit-laden vehicles on the Srinagar-Jammu highway will raise questions and "the onus of convincing fruit growers that nothing is deliberate lies on the government of the day". Lone, in a series of tweets, said, "The stranding of fruit-laden vehicles in the context of an extremely hard policy during the last three years and total detachment from the masses will raise questions."
The PC president said the apple horticulturists were not asking for doles or government jobs. "Horticulture is the heart of Kashmir's rural economy. The apple horticulturists are not asking for a dole or a government job. They are requesting an efficient transport system. This should be a matter of right in any civilized country," he said.
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Pertinently, today, the apple traders across the valley protested and told the LG administration that eight thousand vehicles loaded with apples are stuck on the highway and the traffic police are not allowing them to go to Jammu. Meanwhile, the chief secretary of the LG administration, Arun Kumar Mehta, called two meetings with the concerned officers in the past few days in which the traffic police were instructed to send the vehicles loaded with apples to Jammu without any disturbance.
While admitting about the helpless vehicles, the Divisional Kashmir PK Pole said that tonight all 4,000 trucks stranded on the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway will be cleared and that there were natural reasons for halting trucks on the highway. Pole said that all trucks including fruit-laden trucks will be cleared on the National Highway by tonight.
He added that trucks and other vehicles are only halted on the highway when there are shooting stones at some places along the highway and due to inclement weather. "The allegations leveled by fruit growers' associations that trucks are deliberately halted on the highway are a half-truth. By tonight all trucks will be cleared on the highway," he added.
"Truckers should use the alternate Mughal road to lessen the burden on Srinagar-Jammu National Highway, while the administration is making all efforts to maintain the flow. Drivers of empty vehicles also appealed to the Mughal road," he said.
