Following heavy snowfall and severe weather conditions over the past two days, traffic movement has been blocked on nearly 245 roads of Himachal Pradesh, including four national highways, as per an official release on Saturday.
The State Emergency Operation Centre informed that traffic movement along four national highways including the Manali Leh National Highway NH-03, Kullu's Highway NH 705, Kinnaur Highway NH-05 and Lahoul Spiti Highway NH 505 has been hit amid heavy snowfall.
"Around 6 inches snowfall was recorded till Saturday morning in and around the Kharapather region of the state leading to the blockage of National Highway 705," the state's traffic police said on its official Twitter handle.
Apart from the blockage of roads, 623 electricity supply schemes have been affected due to severe weather conditions, as per the reports.
Most hill destinations, including Shimla, Kullu, Chamba, Manali, and Dalhousie received light to heavy snowfall over the past 24 hours.
Locals are overjoyed as it has ended the prolonged dry spell.
"The state is receiving good amount of snow. However, the spell is much lower here," said a resident of Shimla.
Meanwhile, tourists have started rushing to the region to experience the snowfall. "We did not expect snowfall here, but woke up to this mesmerizing view. It is an experience in itself," said a tourist from Kolkata.
The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast dry weather for the next few days in the state.
According to IMD, the maximum and minimum temperatures in Himachal Pradesh on Saturday were recorded at 6 degrees Celsius and -4 degrees Celsius. The lowest temperature of minus 7.2 degrees was recorded at Keylong district.
According to an earlier tweet by a weather expert, an icy chill would prevail in North India between January 14 and 19, with the peak likely to be between January 16 and 18.
( With inputs from ANI )
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