Kerala seeks Centre, Jammu and Kashmir Government's help to rescue over 200 tourists

NEW DELHI: Kerala has sought urgent help from the Centre and Jammu and Kashmir Government to rescue over 200 tourists from the state who are still stranded in flood-hit Srinagar.

Kerala Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala told PTI today that 150 people who are struck in Hotel Royal Bhattu in the Dal Lake in Srinagar have reported that the hotel is badly affected due to floods and they have been deprived of basic facilities like drinking water and food.

Many of them require urgent medical care as they have been stranded in the hotel for several days under stress and trauma and some of them are heart patients, the state minister said.

"Government's urgent intervention is required to help evacuate the stranded tourists in the Valley," he said.

Chennithala said he has contacted Defence Minister Arun Jaitley, Defence Secretary, Union Home Secretary and some Ministers in the Jammu and Kashmir Government seeking their help to evacuate the affected persons.

Nearly 400 tourists from Kerala were lodged in various hotels in the Valley and of them 135 have been evacuated so far.

Those evacuated have been lodged at the Kerala House and other places in the national capital after the state government arranged facilities for their stay.

Chennithala has been in Delhi for the last three days trying to coordinate with various agencies for the safe evacuation of Keralites from the flood-hit Valley. He said he is receiving frantic calls from relatives of those stranded.

Due to the failure of communication network in the Valley, there are problems in reaching out to the affected.