Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah has expressed apprehension that the lieutenant governor’s decision to ban helicopter services for Amarnath pilgrims during the upcoming Yatra will send a wrong message about Kashmir.
Omar’s opposition to LG Manoj Sinha’s decision, which was taken on the advice of the Union home ministry, signals an open challenge to the Centre.
The Amarnath Yatra, to be conducted in the aftermath of the Pahalgam terror attack, is scheduled to begin on July 3.
The LG’s administration had on Monday declared the Yatra routes to the Amarnath cave shrine as “no flying zones” and banned any kind of aviation devices, including UAVs, drones and balloons, from July 1 to August 10.
The Yatra has two routes — the traditional Pahalgam route and the shorter
Baltal route.
The order was silent about helicopter services, although it was implied that choppers fell within the directive’s ambit.
On Tuesday evening, Omar took exception to the move. “It is good that the Amarnath Yatra is about to begin. We also want it to proceed smoothly,” he told reporters.
“(But) there is only one thing that I find bizarre... that the helicopter services are not permitted this year. This sends the wrong message to the rest of the nation.”
“I do not have the intelligence inputs on the basis of which this decision was taken. But I think it is for the first time in many years that there is no permission for helicopter services through Pahalgam and Baltal. It should not send a wrong message to the rest of the country with respect to the situation here,” Omar added.
The Shri Amarnath Shrine Board, which is headed by Sinha, on Wednesday confirmed that helicopter services would not be available to pilgrims this year.
“The competent authority has in its order dated June 16, 2025, declared all routes of the Shri Amarnathji Yatra, including both the Pahalgam and Baltal axes, as a ‘no flying zone’ from July 1 to August 10, 2025. Consequently, helicopter services for pilgrim travel shall not be available in the yatra area during the Shri Amarnathji Yatra, 2025,” the SASB said on its website.
Officials said the decision was taken following a meeting headed by Union home secretary Govind Mohan on Monday and attended by Intelligence Bureau director Tapan Kumar Deka, Jammu and Kashmir chief secretary Atal Dulloo, director-general of police Nalin Prabhat and General Officer Commanding 15 Corps Prashant Srivastava.
Omar seems to have gone on the offensive against the LG’s administration and the Centre, which has been delaying the decision to restore statehood to Jammu and Kashmir.
Last week, Omar voiced frustration over his limited control over the bureaucracy after the LG ordered large-scale transfers in the government without consulting him.
Sinha later claimed that he only controlled Jammu and Kashmir Police while the elected government oversaw the rest of the departments.
The chief minister had said getting transferred was the biggest fear of a Jammu and Kashmir officer, but the authority to effect transfers now lay somewhere else, hinting at the LG’s iron grip on the administration.
Earlier, he had publicly complained about how he had been “demoted” from the chief minister of a state in 2014 to the chief minister of a Union Territory, while Sinha had been promoted from a junior railways minister to an LG with sweeping powers.