Over 60 tourists stranded in two villages of Himachal Pradesh's Kinnaur district after multiple landslides on July 25 were evacuated to safer places on Tuesday evening, a senior official said.
The tourists were rescued after the blocked Sangla-Chhitkul road was opened for their evacuation, state Disaster Management Director Sudesh Kumar Mokhta said.
The road has been closed again until the clearance to open it is given by the Public Works Department and the team from the Geological Survey of India, Mokhta said.
60 to 80 tourists were stranded in Chhitkul and Rakshak, the last villages of the Bapsa valley, as the Sangla-Chhitkul road was closed for traffic after the landslides, he said.
The district administration was facing difficulty in clearing heavy boulders from the road. Owners of apple orchards were objecting to the boulders being dumped near their orchards located down the road, Mokhta added.
Nine tourists were killed on Sunday after heavy boulders fell on their tempo traveller near Basteri in Kinnaur.
Multiple landslides triggered by rains occurred near Basteri on the Sangla-Chitkul road, resulting in the collapse of a bridge and damage to some vehicles.