Shimla, February 14: Nearly 75 tourists, stranded at Tushali resort on the Kufri-Chail road for the past five days, were evacuated by the Shimla Administration in a day-long rescue operation that continued till midnight on Tuesday.
Heaving a sigh of relief on spotting the rescue team in the resort at 12:30 a.m. on Wednesday, the tourists’ group comprising relatives and friends from Delhi and Punjab took the first-aid and medicines from the rescue team and drove towards Chandigarh on the Chail- Kandaghat route.
Most of the rescued belonged to Greater Kailash, Maya Enclave, Rajindra Nagar, Kirti Nagar and Dwarka, and Ferozepur and Ludhiana in Punjab.
They had checked in at Shilon Bagh resort on February 9 for a family get-together and due to heavy snowfall, got stuck there till February 12 when the resort ran out of power, ration, and diesel for generators.
On the same evening, they moved to Tushali resort, at a distance of nearly 100 metres from Shilon. Alarmed by a similar shortage of essentials, the tourists raised an alarm.
The tourists left Tushali resort after expressing gratitude to the staff for co-operation at the time of need. They thanked Sandeep, a grocery shop owner at Chail, who got crucial medicines for two old-aged heart patients in the group.
The resort staff said “Sandeep walked quiet a long distance in the snow and then took a bus to Solan to get the medicines and again walked back to deliver the medicines at four in the evening, yesterday”.
Sanjay Vaid, a member of the group had told The Indian Express over telephone at 10:30 pm (while still at Tushali) on Tuesday night that they had spotted the light of a vehicle far off moving towards their direction.
“As the resort staff informed that this was the snow cutter every one has come out to see the first ray of hope in this dark night. Now we are hopeful that we would be out in another two hours.” (Source: Expressindia)Labels: News-Events