Jalandhar: Fog halts President’s city visit, leaves commuters stranded for hours

Jalandhar: President Draupadi Murmu couldn’t arrive in Jalandhar as scheduled, but traffic diversions imposed by the police since Friday morning caused inconvenience. Murmu was scheduled to attend the convocation ceremony at the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar National Institute of Technology, but fog prevented her flight from taking off from Amritsar. Her aircraft was scheduled to land at the Adampur Air Force Base, from where she would then travel by road to the campus. More than two hours before her visit, the road from Adampur to the NIT campus was closed.
Commuters traveling from Phagwara to Jalandhar also had a difficult experience. Sameer Bakshi, who had to reach his office in Jalandhar from Phagwara this morning, said, “It’s usually a 25-minute journey, but today it took me 2.5 hours. The traffic police diverted vehicles near Haveli to Curo Mall, after which I entered the city via Cantonment.” People living at Pathankot Chowk, Maqsudan Chowk, and other roads leading to Jalandhar from the PAP Complex were also stuck in traffic jams for a long time. Later, Governor Gulab Chand Kataria arrived at the campus and presented degrees to students.