Dehradun: Keeping in view the ongoing COVID pandemic, the Uttarakhand government on Tuesday decided to cancel Kanwar Yatra this year. On July 2, the state government had cancelled the Kanwar Yatra to Haridwar in the month of Sawan due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Giving further details to ANI, state government spokesperson Subodh Uniyal had said that the government has decided to cancel the Kanwar Yatra as a precautionary measure. Last year too, the yatra was cancelled due to the Coronavirus situation.

This time every year during the Hindu calendar month of ‘Saavan’, thousands of devotees from across India, undertake the pilgrimage called ‘Kanwar Yatra’. These pilgrims visit Haridwar, Gaumukh, and Gangotri in Uttarakhand and Sultanganj in Bihar to fetch the waters of river Ganga. Later, the holy water is dispensed as offerings to Lord Shiva in temples.

On July 8, Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami had said a decision on the Kanwar yatra will be taken in a day or two.

“As you are aware Covid has upset everything. Our effort at the moment is to somehow begin the Char Dham Yatra. A decision on Kanwar Yatra is likely in a day or two,” Dhami told reporters in Haridwar on Wednesday.

The chief minister, who took over recently, last visited Haridwar on Wednesday to perform a puja and take the blessings of saints and seers.

An inter-state coordination meeting of police officials here recently suggested that the Kanwar Yatra should remain suspended for the time being in view of a possible third wave of COVID-19. Permitting the yatra in the time of the pandemic is fraught with risks.

Dhami had recently said that a final decision on Kanwar Yatra would be taken only in consultation with the governments of neighbouring states.

The Uttarakhand government had decided to partially open the Char Dham Yatra for locals only from July 1 as livelihoods of a large section of the state’s population depends on the pilgrimage, but the Uttarakhand High Court had put a stay on the Cabinet decision.

On Monday, the Indian Medical Association’s Uttarakhand chapter had written to Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami requesting him to cancel the Kanwar Yatra this year for public safety in view of a possible third wave of COVID-19.

Drawing the Chief minister’s attention to the warnings of medical experts about a third wave of the pandemic in a letter, the IMA’s state secretary Amit Khanna asked him to not allow the proposed Kanwar Yatra to go ahead.

“We request you to disallow the proposed Kanwar Yatra in July-August, 2021, as the third wave of Covid pandemic is ready to knock on the doors of this country according to several specialists,” Khanna said on behalf of the IMA in the letter.