Snow being cleared from a road at Lahaul on Friday. Photo: Jai Kumar

Dipender Manta

Tribune News Service

Mandi, February 10

The Border Roads Organisation (BRO) has sped up the snow clearing work in Lahaul-Spiti, where roads have been blocked since January 25.A BRO official said it would be a challenging task as there was heavy snow from Manali up to Lahaul.The BRO has engaged its workforce and machinery to speed up the work on internal roads of Lahaul to provide relief to area residents, who have been without power supply and road connectivity.BRO Commander AK Awasthi said: “We have engaged six dozers, four excavators, four JCB machines, one wheel loader and other machinery at different points between Stingri-Tandi, Udaipur-Tandi and Kelar- Sansari roads, which are under 8 feet snow at present.”“However Stingri and Keylong have been opened, it will take time to restore them completely,” he said.The BRO has deployed around 250 labourers for snow clearing in Lahaul. The pace of work will depend on the weather.“Efforts are on to open roads on time. Let’s hope the weather remains good. This year, the area received heavy snowfall and it will be a challenging task for the BRO to clear the roads in view of an avalanche threat,” said Awasthi.The harsh weather has crippled life in Lahaul-Spiti, where there is no power and water. Taps and pipes have frozen.Seventeen villages of Miyar and Tindi are still under darkness, where electricity lines have been damaged. The area is inaccessible for most part of the year. Officials of the Electricity Department could not reach the area due to snow. They said they were waiting for the weather to improve so that the roads could be opened.Superintending Engineer of Himachal Pradesh Electricity Department, Kullu, Rajiv Sood said the power supply had been restored in most of the areas, while Miyar and Tindi were still inaccessible due to heavy damage to the electricity lines.