Why more gates? Amritsar in a jam

GS Paul

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, May 2

The Sikhs’ holiest shrine, Golden Temple, is visited by nearly one lakh tourists from all over the globe daily yet many among them go back with bad memories of inconvenience during their pilgrimage.

Started in August 2015, Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal’s ambitious project to make the 500-metre approach to the Golden Temple the ‘world’s best street’ has witnessed lopsided planning and haphazard beautification without sparing any thought for creating an alternative road to the shrine.

While the sidewalks have been dug up to lay sewerage, the installation of gates near Town Hall at Katra Ahluwalia market lane, near Jallianwala Bagh and near Sri Guru Ram Dass Serai is causing traffic congestion.

Rampant encroachments on scores of narrow, winding and labyrinthine roads in the vicinity add to the woes of tourists resulting in frequent traffic jams and a snail’s pace of movement.

While VVIPs manage to drive to the plaza of shrine, courtesy the police, commoners are left with the only option of walking along dug up roads strewn with debris and earth. Due to negligence of the civic authorities, small-time vendors and even the shopkeepers along both sides of the road encroach on a major portion of the road.

Although policemen have been deployed at the spot to ‘facilitate smooth passage for pilgrims’, there is no concerted approach which takes a toll on the visitors. Numerous drives by the civic authorities to free the road and footpaths from encroachments have yielded no results.

The most frequented routes to reach the Golden Temple are from the Hall Gate and Mahan Singh Gate from the bus stand. Here, a large number of shops selling religious material, apparels, cosmetics, suiting and shirting have sprung up along the route.

The other route from Ghee Mandi and Bazar Sandukan to the Jallianwala Bagh in the vicinity of the shrine too is jampacked since the main approach from Dharam Singh Market is occupied by vendors on either side.

Consequently, the pedestrians have to negotiate their way to reach their destination. Hoteliers, restaurant owners and shopkeepers maintain that it was adversely affecting their business.

A tourist, Catherine Smith from the US, viewed that the ambience of the Golden Temple soothes the soul but reaching here was a nightmare. “Efforts of the government to beautify the vicinity of the shrine are laudable, but encroachments have led to chaos”, she said.

Another pilgrim from New Delhi, Raj Kanwal, opined that in view of the heavy rush on all the routes to this destination, the authorities should have made prior provision for alternate passages.