Himalayan News Service

Shimla, March 28:

The 13,000-feet high Rohtang pass may open for the first time in April instead of June.

The pass, which affords a breathtaking view of the landscape of picturesque Himachal Pradesh in summer, remains cut off for around six months a year, but will open early largely due to lesser snowfall last winter and also due to better snow clearing machinery employed by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO).

"Out of the six passes on the Manali-Leh road, the Rohtang pass remains the most difficult," says Brigadier Ashok Sinha, chief engineer of BRO, at Manali, 280 km from here.

"We are hopeful of opening the pass for traffic by late April. While earlier the snow-clearing work would actually begin in April and the pass would open in June for traffic," he said. The pass is an important spot on the itinerary of tourists visiting Kullu valley.

The rush is so heavy that the authorities have been battling with pollution in recent years.

Two years ago, the pass was in the limelight due to multinational soft drink giants Coke and Pepsi, among other companies, painting and defacing rocks on the winding road leading up to the pass.Environmentalists had moved the Supreme Court calling for strict action against the violators, who had to later remove their advertisements from the rocks that are millions of years old rocks.