Jammu, May 5 (IANS) Two persons were found dead while two others are reported to be missing when the vehicle they were travelling in was found on Tuesday in a gorge on the Mughal Road in Jammu and Kashmir, officials said.

Officials added that two persons have died while two others remain missing after a vehicle they were travelling in was found in a nallah near Chhattapani along the Mughal Road.

Police in Poonch district said that four individuals had gone missing on Monday while travelling on the Mughal Road, prompting a large-scale search and rescue operation.

During the search operation on Tuesday, the missing vehicle was traced in a nallah at Chhattapani.

Upon retrieval, two bodies were recovered from the site.

Officials said search operations are ongoing to trace the remaining two missing persons.

“All efforts are being made to locate them at the earliest,” officials said, adding that further details will be shared as the operation progresses.

There was snowfall in the Pir Ki Gali area of the Mughal Road on Monday and on Tuesday due to which authorities closed the road for vehicular traffic.

Mughal Road is the road between Bufliaz, a town in the Poonch district, to the Shopian district in the Valley.

The 84-km road traces a historic route used in the Mughal period over the Pir Panjal Pass, at an altitude of 3,500 metres higher than the Banihal Pass at 2,832 metres.

It also provides an alternative route into the Kashmir Valley other than the Jammu–Srinagar highway.

The road passes through Buffliaz, Behramgalla, Chandimarh, Dogray (Dogran), Godawan, Poshana, Chattapani, Peer Ki Gali, Aliabad in Poonch and Zaznar, Dubjian, Hirpora in Shopian district.

After conquering the Kashmir Valley, the Mughal emperor Akbar strengthened the route into an ‘Imperial Road’ stretching from Lahore to Kashmir.

In modern times, the route has been referred to as the ‘Mughal Road’.

The new road was proposed in the 1950s to improve the economy of the Kashmir Valley.

The then Chief Minister Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah took up this project in 1979 and named it the ‘Mughal Road’, but it came to a halt as terrorism took over.

Bafliaz Bridge on the road was blown up by the terrorists.

Actual construction began in October 2005 with a target of completion in March 2007 and an estimated cost of Rs 255 crore.

A conservation trust petitioned the Supreme Court to stop construction, citing the disturbance to animals in the Hirpora Wildlife Sanctuary, especially the endangered Markhor goat and claiming the road would get early snowfall in winter and hence would not serve as an alternate route to the existing Jammu-Srinagar highway.

However, the court gave conditional permission for the construction of the road.

–IANS

sq/khz