KL Report
SRINAGAR
The cross Line of Control (LoC) trade between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad resumed on Thursday after six days. The trade was suspended over the arrest of a driver from Muzaffarabad following the recovery of drugs from his vehicle.
Talat Parvaiz, Deputy Comissioner, Baramulla said, “The cross-LoC trade resumed this morning as 15 trucks from this side started their journey towards Chakoti.”
The trade and travel on Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road between the two sides of Kashmir was suspended last Friday over the arrest of a driver after 305 packets of brown sugar were recovered from fruit boxes in his truck.
Since then 22 drivers from Muzaffarabad were stranded at Salamabad Trade Facilitation Centre in Uri on this side while 49 drivers from Kashmir’s this side were held up at Chakoti.
The deadlock ended after authorities agreed to resume trade activities. The stranded drivers along with their vehicles on both sides of the LoC returned to their native homes late Wednesday night.
Meanwhile Anayat Hussain, the driver from Muzaffarabad, and local trader Zahoor Ahmad Malla, who was to receive the consignment, continue to remain in police custody. A case under Section 8/21 of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act has been registered against the duo and investigations are on.
Pertinently in January 2014, authorities had seized drugs worth nearly Rs 100 crore from a truck coming from Muzaffarabad, which led to brief suspension of cross-Line of Control trade after police arrested the Pakistani driver of the vehicle.
In August 2013, police recovered cocaine worth Rs 10 crore from a truck, plying on Srinagar-Muzaffarabad route, at Sheeri in Uri sector.
