200 Gujaratis including BJP MLA stuck in Srinagar

RAJKOT: As many as 200 Gujarati tourists from coastal towns of Rajula and Jafarabad in Amreli district including Rajula BJP MLA Hira Solanki are stuck in Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir since Friday afternoon amid the curfew imposed in the restive state following the encounter of Burhan Muzaffar Wani. However, all tourists are safe and are staying in a hotel in Srinagar.
A 22-year-old commonder of the terror group Hizbul Mujahideen was killed in an operation on Friday in Kashmir.After the encounter by security forces, local residents in Srinagar and other parts of the Kashmir came out on streets and held protests and pelted stones on security forces and tourists vehicles.
According to sources, BJP MLA Hira Solanki sponsored the Amarnath Yatra tour to over 200 people of Rajula, Jafarabad and nearby villages. “We left for Jammu via train on July 2 and then boarded a bus which had Punjab RTO passing to Amarnath Yatra. After completing Yatra were returning to Srinagar on Friday where stones were pelted on our bus. Curfew was imposed across the region. But we were safely rescued by security forces and reached to a hotel in Srinagar. All 200 tourists from Amreli district are safe," said Vipul Laheri, a photographer from Rajula who is also part of the pilgrimage tour.
Hira Solanki had reached to Amarnath using helicopter and returned to Srinagar but as soon as he learnt about the stone pelting on buses in which Gujarat tourists, he rushed to the spot secured their passage to hotel. The ban on internet services have been imposed in Kashmir and people who are stuck up in hotel are unable to connect with their family members.
Hira Solanki is the brother of Koli leader and Bhavnagar Rural MLA Parshottam Solanki.