32nd batch of over 1,100 Amarnath pilgrims leave Jammu for cave shrine

Jammu: The 32nd batch of Amarnath Yatris with over 1,100 pilgrims Thursday left the base camp here for the holy cave shrine in south Kashmir Himalayas amid tight security arrangements, officials said.

Over 4.3 lakh devotees paid obeisance at the 3888-metre high shrine since the commencement of the Yatra on July 1, the officials said.

The 62-day annual pilgrimage to Amarnath shrine commenced from the twin tracks -- the traditional 48-km Nunwan-Pahalgam route in Anantnag and the shorter 14-km Baltal route in the Ganderbal -- on July 1.

In the early hours of Thursday, 1,198 pilgrims -- 1,023 men, 116 women, 58 seers and a child -- left the Bhagwati Nagar base camp here for the twin base camps of Baltal and Pahalgam in a convoy of 43 vehicles, the officials said.

As many as 932 pilgrims, headed for Pahalgam, left in a convoy of 33 vehicles, while another convoy of 10 vehicles carrying 266 pilgrims left for the Baltal base camp, they added.

The Yatra is scheduled to conclude on August 31.