By Sudeshna Sarkar, IANS,
Kathmandu: Andhra Pradesh Housing Minister Kanna Lakshminarayana and 10 other pilgrims to Mount Kailash have been safely brought back to Kathmandu from Tibet border and are on their way to New Delhi, their tour operator in Nepal said.
The minister, who arrived in Kathmandu June 12 to go on a pilgrimage to Mt Kailash in Tibet across Nepal’s northern border, had to halt in the border area on his way back due to bad weather.
They had reached Simikot, a border town in Nepal, where they had to stay for one and a half days as the weather turned rough and prevented helicopter flights.
Finally on Tuesday, when the skies cleared, two choppers flown by Nepal’s Mountain Air and Fishtail Air flew the group to Nepalgunj, one of the major towns in western Nepal.
Narendra Bhatt, the chief of Heritage Tours and Travels that had organised the journey, said he himself and two Indian officials went to Nepalgunj in the morning to bring the minister and his group back to the capital by a chartered Buddha Air flight.
Though Lakshminarayana could not undertake the yatra around Mt Kailash, he and the rest of the pilgrims were well and were booked on Jetlite for their return to New Delhi Tuesday.
The flight was delayed, but Bhatt said the minister and his friends would be able to reach the Indian capital by the evening.