Avinash (81) and Nandini Barve (75)

MUMBAI: Even a large chunk of tourists cancelled their travel plans to J&K in the aftermath of Tuesday’s terror attack, Borivli’s Sandhya Nair (48), who is travelling with her 16-year-old daughter, said they have decided to stay back and repose their faith in the Indian Army.
“Today under the Army and local police’s vigilance, we visited Gulmarg and took gondola rides,” she said, adding it was her duty to register her protest against the attack by completing the tour.
“Our batch of 17 women from Mumbai left Pahalgam for Srinagar a few minutes before the attack,” Nair told TOI over phone. Her group will return on April 25 as earlier planned.
Avinash Barve (81) and wife Nandini (75), both retired school teachers from Thane, said common Kashmiri people are strongly condemning the attack.
“Today’s bandh and agitations show the local population wants terrorism to be eradicated. It was our duty to be with them and show our courage to face cowardly attacks,” Avinash said. The Barves were at Sonmarg Wednesday along with 13 others.
Some others such as Venkatesh Hari and his family, Suresh Dhemare, Bal Wasekar, Husenbasha Shaikh and Rasika Patil were at Nishat Bagh, Gulmarg, Shankaracharya temple and Sonmarg when the contacted them over phone.
Tour operators said Maharashtra, Gujarat, West Bengal and Karnataka contribute the largest number of tourists to the valley. Tour operator Veena Patil said 35-40% of tourists have cancelled. Tour operator Atul Mohile said nearly 1 lakh tourists were still in the valley.
Bashir Wani, Mumbai in-charge J&K tourism, said over 5,000 people each visited Shalimar and Chashme Shahi gardens Wednesday.
“People have rescheduled Pahalgam visit but not cancelled tours.”