Uttarakhand floods: Pune group survived seven-day ordeal

The nightmare for Dnyaneshwar Singore and his group of 18 people is finally over.

Stranded in Badrinath, hoping for their turn to be airlifted to a safer place was an endless wait. After a seven-day ordeal, they were rescued and flown to Dehradun on June 28.

Seeing the destruction in Uttarakhand, Singore, a tour leader of Girikand Travels, and the group of pilgrims are happy to be back in Pune in one piece.

The group of 18 members was on Char Dham Yatra and they were supposed to return to Pune on June 18, but they got stuck at Badrinath.

“This was my seventh visit to Uttarakhand and I had never seen such destruction before. From June 14 till June 28, we were stuck in Badrinath. We didn’t know whether we would be able to return to our city. But thanks to the army personnel, who rescued thousands like us from Badrinath,” said Singore.

The group was on their last leg of their pilgrimage when they got stuck in the floods. They had already visited Gangotri, Yamunotri and Kedarnath. They reached Badrinath on June 14 when it started raining heavily, washing away the roads leading to Badrinath.

They were stranded with thousands of people.

But as days passed, the group started losing patience and hopes of returning to Pune looked grim.

“After witnessing landslides and heavy rains in Badrinath, some pilgrims started crying. Some even blamed us for not helping them in get out of Badrinath. But we had no option but to wait for help,” Singore said. 

On June 20, the army began airlifting stranded people from Badrinath, lifting their sagging spirit. “Every day we would stand in a queue, hoping to be airlifted. We did this for seven days and finally on June 28, we were airlifted to Dehradun,” he added.