The 40-day period marks the harshest phase of the winter in the Kashmir valley.
Indefinite curfew was clamped in all major towns of the Kashmir Valley on Saturday in the wake of protests, even as the death toll in the violent clashes between locals and security forces rose to four.
Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli, and Shreevats Goswami spoke out-some demanding an immediate and total severing of sporting ties with Pakistan.
"China is an absolutely impossible factor to ignore in what has been our confrontation with Pakistan," Tharoor said.
The highway was closed on Saturday due to heavy snowfall and landslides.
Fresh clashes broke out in curfew-bound Kashmir Valley on Saturday in which 30 persons, including 15 security personnel were injured, as protests against the Ramban killings on Thursday continued in Jammu and Kashmir.
Rahul said it is clear that things are "not normal" in Jammu and Kashmir.
Kashmir Valley continued to remain in the grip of a severe cold wave even as the authorities claimed to have restored power supply in the entire valley on Monday evening, reports Mukhtar Ahmad.
Mercury plummeted in Kashmir Valley on Thursdayafter a slight respite for few days, dropping further below the freezing point with Kargil recording a new low of minus 15.8 degrees Celsius this season.
Vijay Kumar, the bank manager, was shot inside the premises on Thursday morning and died on the way to hospital.
India and Pakistan agreed on a ceasefire along the border in J&K, the first formal truce between the two armies since the outbreak of militancy in the state.
Curfew remained in force in six police station areas of the city, Anantnag town, Kokernag and Khanpora in Baramulla district as restrictions on assembly of four or more people continued in entire Kashmir.
Stone pelting in Kashmir valley appears to be fast turning into a lucrative 'business' for some unemployed youths offering this 'service' for a price.
The government continues to grope in the dark while looking for an initiative, which would end the three month cycle of violence that has claimed 69 lives and disturbed the peace in Kashmir Valley.
Authorities have imposed curfew or restrictions on movement of people in most parts of Kashmir Valley to foil plans of separatists to hold protests demanding handing over of the body of Parliament attack convict Mohammad Afzal Guru to his family.
"The Secretary-General regrets the latest loss of life. He (Ban) calls for an immediate end to violence and urges calm and restraint by all concerned," Martin Nesirky told media persons on Wednesday, adding that Ban was "closely following events".
Curfew was on Saturday lifted from Kashmir Valley, a week after it was imposed following hanging of Parliament attack convict Mohammad Afzal Guru. "Curfew has been lifted from all the ten districts in the Valley," a police spokesman said.
Curfew continued without any relaxation in Srinagar and other major towns of the Kashmir valley on Thursday where protestors defied curfew and clashed with the police in Sopore town. Meanwhile, Yasir Hamid Sheikh, cousin of Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front chairman Mohammad Yaseen Malik, succumbed to injuries at a private hospital in New Delhi in the wee hours of Thursday, said party spokesman Altaf Khan.
Traveller and trekker Amit Tyagi writes about the hidden gems of Kashmir. You won't regret including them in your next itinerary.
Two soldiers who were critically wounded in Thursday's terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Gulmarg succumbed to their injuries, raising the death toll in the ambush to four.
'Pakistan's only concern has been while they were on the FATF watch list was to distance their State institutions and organs from any direct connection with the actual execution of militancy inside Kashmir.'
Security forces on Saturday killed three terrorists, including two who had allegedly snatched rifles from policemen in Kulgam district earlier this week, in separate operations in Shopian and Sopore areas of Kashmir valley. Acting on specific information, security forces on Friday night launched a search operation in Lehend-Habdipora area of the Shopian district, 52 kms from Srinagar, officials said.
Known as 'paradise on the earth', moutnain-locked Kashmir Valley would soon come up on the country's railway map as the local train traffic would commence in the Valley by end of 2006.
Life in the Kashmir valley was affected on Monday by a protest shutdown against the killing of two youth in firing allegedly by the army on Sunday.
Khanday was reinstated during a cabinet meeting chaired by state chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad in Jammu Sunday.
In what was perhaps the most critical meeting before full-scale war broke out, Shastri defined India's immediate war objectives to his defence minister, army, and air force chiefs: 'To defend against Pakistan's attempts to grab Kashmir by force and to make it abundantly clear that Pakistan would never be allowed to wrest Kashmir from India; To destroy the offensive power of Pakistan's armed forces...' A fascinating excerpt from Shiv Kunal Verma's must-read 1965: A Western Sunrise India's War With Pakistan.
Tourism to Kashmir has survived at full strength after a weekend hotel attack that killed 5 Indian visitors, as thousands of people flock to the scenic Himalayan region, an official said Monday.
'The wave of terrorism is over in Kashmir. Local people do not support it.'
The NIA had arrested seven persons on July 24 in the case of alleged funding of terror and subversive activities in the Kashmir Valley to fuel unrest.
The paramilitary had cut down the use of these vehicles for anti-Naxal operations drastically to a 'bare minimum' after they were targeted in improvised explosive device blasts in the Left Wing Extremism-hit areas.
Law Minister Kiren Rijiju's car grazed a truck on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway in Ramban district on Saturday evening, officials said.
The Kashmir Valley, where normal life was disrupted for eight days due to the agitation to end the 'economic blockade', limped back to normalcy on Tuesday following the separatists' decision to suspend the strike for three days. The separatists had decided to suspend the strike for three days to provide relief to students, labourers and other sections of the society who were hit by the shutdown. Vehicles and business establishments perched black flags atop their buildings.
In a first train mishap in Kashmir Valley, at least 20 passengers were injured when a Qazigund to Srinagar train derailed at Sadhora village in south Kashmir's Anantnag district on Wednesday afternoon.
According to officials, 46 deaths have been recorded in terrorism-related violence since January this year in the twin border districts of Rajouri and Poonch and nearby Reasi district.
Early Thursday morning, people in various localities of Srinagar poured out onto the streets staging protests against alleged human rights violations in Kashmir.
After nearly a week, curfew was lifted on Sunday in the entire Kashmir Valley in view of the situation remaining generally peaceful but prohibitory orders have been imposed in Baramulla, Anantnag and Pulwama districts besides some parts of Srinagar, officials said.
The grenade blast which killed a protester took place at Brakpora village in Anantnag district of south Kashmir.
'We need to raise the costs and consequences for Pakistan. It is long overdue. Our initial surgical strike was effective for about six months. Then, the Balakot strike provided a deterrent for perhaps two to three years. But we cannot operate under the assumption that such limited responses will suffice for decades to come.'
A bright sunny day and rise in night temperature brought some respite from cold in most parts of the northern India except Kashmir valley where the mercury dipped further.
