Only 2 functional ski-lifts for whole Gulmarg

Abid Khan
Srinagar, Feb 13:Gulmarg that is known all over world for its soft powdered snow have got only two functional ski lift facilities available for hundreds skiers who daily do skiing there.
Each day hundreds of tourists both local and foreigners visit Gulmarg for having a taste of skiing. The advanced level skier’s go for higher reaches but they are few in number and most of them do skiing on the low slopes that are in Gulmarg. Apart from tourists the regular courses of different institutes like Youth Services and Sports, Indian Institute of Mountaineering and Skiing, Kashmir University, Sports Council keep going on in Gulmarg. For all these skiers Gulmarg has got only two functional T-bar, ski lifts. The third ski lift near Gulmarg Club of tourism department remain closed.
A T-bar ski-lift, also called T-bar, is a mechanised system for transporting skiers and snowboarders uphill, along the surface of the slope.It is generally employed for low-capacity slopes in large resorts and small local areas servicing skiers numbered in the dozens rather than in the hundreds or thousands.
But in Gulmarg it is used to service thousands of skiers each day, which creates lot of problems for the skiers as it always remain crowded Skier had to wait for hours in order to get benefit of lift. Most of the time skier gets uphill by foot.
“There is essential need of more ski lifts in Gulmarg. The present two functional lifts are not serving any purpose and skiers gets only two to three runs down the slope after waiting for their turn on lifts” said Principal IISM, KA Mir.
He said that the lifts have tremendous load and always remain crowded and there is urgent need of installing of more ski lifts on different slopes.
“We need more ski lifts in order to serve skiers in better way. At present every skier waits for half an hour to get his turn on lift on order to climb uphill” he said.
Few years’ back there was ski lift near Church, which was considered best slope for advance level skiing. But Tourism department which handles all the affairs in Gulmarg shifted that to baby slope near ski shop.
“We cannot understand why the department shifted ski lift from church to baby slope. It was best slope among the existing slopes that we have got it Gulmarg but this no one does skiing there,” said Niyaz Ahmad. “ If the department was in need to serve the baby slope for beginners then they should have procured new lift for it instead of abandoning the Church slope.”
He said that skiers, which comprises of all ages had to face lot of hardship for doing skiing.
“Before coming to Gulmarg skiers think that they will have fun in doing skiing but upon reaching here they find huge rush for lifts and that gives them totally different picture. Most of the skiers do skiing without using the lift facilities in order to have more down runs and in that case have to sweat hard,” he said.
According to experts Gulmarg has got the best natural slopes available and there is no need to develop except installing of more ski lifts.
Muzamil Ahmad, DYSS ski instructor who have been imparting ski training in Gulmarg from last 15 years says, “God has bestowed us with natural slopes and only thing needed is to install more and more ski lifts. In foreign countries there are hundreds of ski lifts on the man made slopes and here we don’t have lifts on natural slopes. They spend lot of money of making for slopes and here we need to install only slopes, as we have got number of beautiful and world-class natural slopes.”
He said that in the name of development Government only doe’s lot of talk and has done nothing to develop Gulmarg up to world-class ski resort.
“What Government has done all these years to develop Gulmarg for the benefit of skiers. Except few concrete structures nothing has changed. Gulmarg is today what it was 30 years back. Even cable car Gondola is not serving any purpose, as it is too costly for local skiers” he said.
Despite repeated attempts Director Tourism, Farooq Ahmad Shah was not available for comments.