Associated Press

Srinagar, February 20:

Kashmir remained cut off from the rest of India for a second day today as heavy snowfall triggered avalanches that killed at least eight people in the Himalayan region, police and officials said.

Road and air links with the Kashmir valley were snapped as the main airport in India’s Jammu-Kashmir state was shut and highways were closed to traffic. Power outages plunged large parts of the state into darkness, while telephone and mobile links remained cut off.

Four men, clearing a section of the 300 km highway were killed when they were caught in an avalanche, said Manish Kumar, an official of the border roads organisation, responsible for the maintenance of highways in the frontier areas. Two other people were killed early today when the roof of their house collapsed in Soura, a Srinagar suburb, after heavy snow battered the city, said a police official speaking on condition of anonymity. Elsewhere in Kashmir, at least 30 houses collapsed overnight, he said.

Authorities have also halted a Hindu pilgrimage to a mountainous cave in Vaishnodevi in southwest Kashmir, after two pilgrims died yesterday from exposure. Most pilgrims, making the journey on foot or on ponies, were turned back, while others waited in Jammu for the weather to improve.