By Shishir Prashant 
PrashantNews
After remaining gridlocked for many days, the local people in Uttarakhand are heaving a sigh of relief from heavy traffic jams in the past 2-3 days.
The traffic in Haridwar city on Thursday was almost normal. In the nearby Rishikesh town also, there was hardly any traffic snarl. The heavy rush of pilgrims has almost vanished from the chardham shrines and other pilgrim centres mainly due to the monsoon fury that triggered landslides and cloudbursts causing havoc in the hills last week.
According to the official data of the state emergency operation centre, the decline in pilgrim footfall did not happen in just one day, After the arrival of monsoon rains on June 20, the chardham yatra began witnessing a continuous dip. In the past one fortnight, a decline of whopping more than 77 percent in pilgrim footfall was registered as torrential rains triggered a series of natural disasters like landslides and cloudbursts in the hills of Uttarakhand which adversely affected the pilgrimage.
On June 19 this year this scene was totally different as a record 63630 pilgrims visited the Chardham yatra shrines on that day. After June 20 when monsoon fury began in the hills, the pilgrim turnout also started declining. On June 24, 47630 pilgrims came for the chardham yatra.
As the monsoon fury intensified, disasters started striking the hill state. Four members of a family including a four-day old infant were killed and three injured when a car fell into a swollen canal at Haldwani area in Nainital district on June 25. The family was returning home to nearby Kitchha town after the delivery at a Haldwani hospital amid heavy rains.
On June 26, a major accident occurred in Rudraprayag district where at least 12 people were feared killed when a mini bus carrying Badrinath-bound pilgrims plunged into the swollen Alaknanda river. A total of 20 people were travelling in the bus which also swept away in the fast currents of the river.
On June 29, nine labourers sleeping in a make-shift camp were feared dead following a cloudburst at Silaiband area on the Yamunotri highway in Uttarkashi district. Since then, the Yamunotri yatra has not resumed as a large portion of the highway was badly damaged. The figure went down further as 23,027 pilgrims offered prayers in the four shrines and also at Hemkund Sahib on the same day.
Heavy rains continued triggering more landslides at several areas in the hill state blocking dozens of roads and highways. Nearly 1269 pilgrims were rescued by the Uttarakhand police near Sonprayag area after landslides disrupted the Kedarnath yatra road in June end. The highways leading to Kedarnath, Badrinath and Gangotri are also being hit by landslides frequently.
On July 2, only 14145 pilgrims came to visit the chardham shrines and Hemkund Sahib.
Meanwhile, the helicopter services to the Chardham pilgrimage centres would remain suspended till September 15 following a series of helicopter mishaps and heavy monsoon rains.
Meanwhile, the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) on Thursday said heavy to very heavy rains are likely to continue over Uttarakhand for the next five days.