Tourists never targeted and are safe in Kashmir, says IGP

Srinagar: Stating that tourists have never been targeted in Kashmir, the Kashmir Police Chief Tuesday said that Kashmir is a safe place for tourists and that police is looking into the authenticity of reports of stone pelting on tourist buses.

“Tourists are never targeted in Kashmir valley. We have seen that no untoward incident has happened with any tourist in Kashmir. They always remain safe here,” Swayam Prakash Pani, IGP Kashmir said over phone.

When asked about the reports that some buses carrying tourists were pelted with stones on Sunday, IGP said, “Police is looking into it. Give me some time I will officially comment on it,” he said and was quick to add that “I can assure that tourists are safe here”.

When contacted, Director Tourism Kashmir said that no tourist was attacked especially in Dalgate Srinagar. “We talked to police but they cleared it that no such incident happened in the area,” the Director claimed.

He further added that apart from last year’s attack on Amarnath yatris, there has not been any instance of violence in the tourism corridor of the state.

“Jammu and Kashmir is the only state in the country which has zero crime record against tourists. The state has registered one lakh foreign tourist footfall in 2017, while the number of domestic visitors crossed 1 crore,” he said.

He maintained that had it been unsafe, we would not have had so many foreign and domestic tourists visiting Kashmir.

It is to mention here that national media has reported that on Sunday evening stone-pelters targeted visitors at three different places in the valley.

“Late Sunday night, two buses carrying tourists from Indonesia were pelted with stones near Dal Lake. Prompt action by houseboat owners saved them. Two women tourists from Abu Dhabi suffered head injuries after being hit by stone thrown at their cab near the airport on Sunday night. A mob attacked a tourist bus at Awantipora in south Kashmir’s Pulwama district and threw stones at it, injuring two women from UP,” a national newspaper has reported. (KNS)