27 MP pilgrims beat death - Times of India

INDORE: For 27 pilgrims of Madhya Pradesh it was a providential escape. They beat death by four hours as they decided to check out of a hotel, hours before it was washed away by flash floods in Chamba near Kedarnath shrine in Uttarakhand. Three elderly couple from the 27-member group that survived the nature's fury arrived in the city on Saturday and recounted the tale of horror and devastation along the Char Dham Yatra. The group which left Indore for Uttarakhand on June 8, started the actual trek from Haridwar on June 11 and offered prayers at Gangotri and Yamunotri shrines, before starting off to Kedarnath on June 14. However, they abandoned the trek mid-way due to bad weather. "We had no option but to wait for weather to improve for which we checked in at a hotel in Chamba (on route to Kedarnath). We waited at the hotel for the weather to clear to restart the yatra to Kedarnath, but with no improvement in weather, we checked out of the hotel and decided to return to Srinagar on June 16 evening," elderly couple from Indore's LIG Colony, Mohan and Sarla Shukla told TOI. They could not recall the name of the hotel. Just four hours later when a bus drove our group to Srinagar, the bus driver received a call on his cell-phone from Chamba, about the hotel (in which we stayed) being washed away by flash flood, the couple recounted. The group stayed in Srinagar till June 17, before returning to Haridwar. Another couple in the group, Rajendra and Sadhna Kanungo recounted how technical snags in the bus, delay in security checks, besides bouts of inclement weather delayed their trek from Haridwar to Gangort i and Yamunotri by 25 hours. "Had that delay not taken place, we would have certainly reached Kedarnath and possibly been swept away by landslide and flood on June 16-17. The inordinate delay which we were cursing initially ultimately turned out to be a saviour for our group," the couple hailing from Usha Nagar Extension (Indore) maintained. Another couple Durga and Rajendra Dubey, who formed part of the same group also returned to Indore safely on Saturday. via Top Stories - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNHxdyAgPlBFGedwRaz0E-itULLBTA&url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/indore/27-MP-pilgrims-beat-death/articleshow/20722578.cms

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