Srinagar: Kashmir’s apple industry is facing potential losses of over Rs 1,200 crore, with farmers and traders struggling to transport thousands of tonnes of fresh apples and pears to fruits markets in the country and abroad following the damage caused to the Jammu-Srinagar national highway by recent torrential rains.Thousands of fruit-laden heavy trucks have been halted in Kashmir, some for nearly three weeks after massive landslides in parts of Jammu division threw the only all-weather national highway between the valley and the rest of the country out of bounds for heavy vehicles.Ajeet Singh, deputy inspector general of traffic police (Kashmir), told The Wire that around 800 trucks crossed a major tunnel connecting Qazigund in Kashmir with Banihal in Jammu till 2 pm on Wednesday after the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) completed the restoration work.“The final figure is expected to rise by the end of the day. Tomorrow, there will be inbound traffic from Jammu to Kashmir,” he said.Trucks carrying apples are seen stranded on the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway at Qazigund, south Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqDozens of farmers and traders have been forced to dump their crops along the highway, as the fruits had rotted while trucks remained stranded on the highway for days amid sunny skies. This had prompted outrage across Kashmir, where around seven lakh families are dependent on the horticulture sector for sustenance, according to the J&K government’s official data.The Wire had reported on September 3 that the prolonged closure of the strategic highway could inflict heavy losses on the farmers.Earlier this week, chief minister Omar Abdullah asked the Union government to hand over the highway to the elected government of Jammu and Kashmir after the NHAI failed to restore it for heavy vehicles following a massive landslide in Udhampur on August 25.A day after Abdullah’s outburst, an emergency meeting was called by Union road minister Nitin Gadkari on Tuesday to review the restoration works, following which some heavy fruit-laden trucks were allowed to proceed to their destinations in other states of the country, and Bangladesh and Nepal.A man walks inside a temporary apple packing store as rotten apples lie on the ground in Pulwama, Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqBasheer Ahmad Basheer, a prominent leader of apple growers and traders in Kashmir, said that around 5,000 truckloads of apples and pears have accumulated in orchards and markets in Kashmir due to the highway closure.On Wednesday, most of Kashmir’s wholesale markets, which have been overflowing with harvested crop, did not accept any fresh produce from the farmers for the third consecutive day.“Some trucks have reached Delhi’s Azadpur Mandi last night with rotten fruit as they were stranded on the highway for more than 15 days. We are apprehending losses between Rs 1,000 crore and Rs 1,200 crore,” said Basheer, who is the president of the Kashmir Valley Fruit Growers Cum Dealers Union (KVFGDU).Growers pack apples in Pulwama Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqThe NHAI, which is responsible for maintaining the highway, is facing tough questions for allegedly delaying the restoration of the 300-metre stretch between Tharad and Balli Nallah in Udhampur. Many netizens have termed this a “deliberate attack” on Kashmir’s horticulture economy.Officials said that around 2,000 fruit-laden trucks were allowed to proceed to their destinations through the narrow Mughal Road over the last few days, but the restrictions on four-axle and five-axle trucks, which are allowed to ply only on the Srinagar-Jammu highway, has left hundreds of them stranded in the valley.At the peak of the apple harvest season, 1,200-1,500 fruit-laden trucks cross the Qazigund tunnel in the Pir Panjal mountains from Kashmir to Jammu division every day, per industry estimates.“Most heavy trucks are destined beyond Delhi to markets in Nepal and Bangladesh and they have been the worst affected. In my more than 40 years of association with the trade, I have never seen our fruit industry in such a crisis,” Basheer said.A farmer sorts muddy apples after floodwaters receded in an orchard in Pulwama, Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqChief minister Abdullah, who is facing criticism from the opposition parties, traders and farmers for allegedly “sleeping on the matter” for more than three weeks, has publicly expressed displeasure with the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Union government which controls the NHAI.“The fact is that this is a national highway and out of our direct control. We can’t order work or put our people there. We are constrained by that circumstance into accepting their way of working on this stretch,” a source in the government said, adding that the chief minister visited the worst-hit site in Udhampur within 48 hours of the landslide and also sought regular updates about the progress of restoration.A senior government official said that continuous rains negatively impacted the restoration work by the NHAI at many places on the highway while the movement of heavy vehicles caused the affected road stretch in Udhampur to sink further due to which it was closed.A muddy apple hangs on a tree, after floodwaters receded in an orchard in Pulwama, Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqHowever, some apple farmers and traders in Kashmir alleged that the elected government was caught off guard amid relentless rains which triggered massive flash floods in many parts of the union territory including the twin capitals of Srinagar and Jammu and overwhelmed the government machinery – a charge denied by the government.Peoples Democratic Party chief Mehbooba Mufti had appealed to Union railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on September 1 to arrange freight trains between Srinagar and Delhi exclusively for transporting apples and pears after fruit rot started to affect markets and trucks were stranded along the Jammu-Srinagar highway.Ghulam Mohiuddin, an apple farmer from south Kashmir’s Pulwama district, said that relentless rains in late August and early September caused flooding in his apple orchard which led to the loss of more than one half of the crop, “Whatever we managed to resuscitate rotted away in trucks on the highway,” he told The Wire.Mohiuddin, whose orchard in Pulwama’s Ratnipora village produces 700-800 boxes of apples that sustain his family year-round, said that the absence of a government mechanism to transport apples in goods trains aggravated the crisis. “If the horticulture department had facilitated farmers to book the trains, maybe our losses could have been lessened,” he said.Abdul Ahad Sofi, 69, an apple grower, sorts apples during the harvest season at an orchard in Pulwama, Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqAmir Rashid, another apple farmer from Pulwama district, said, “What is the use of celebrating the world’s highest railway bridge (built over Chenab in Reasi district) if it can’t come to the rescue of anguished farmers at the time of their need?”The chief minister’s office didn’t respond to queries on the steps taken by the horticulture department to organise goods trains for transporting Kashmir’s fruit to the markets in Delhi and other parts of the country.The uncertain situation surrounding the Jammu-Srinagar highway has also led to a crippling shortage of trucks in Kashmir which has doubled the transportation charges, said Basheer.“For each box of apples, the cost of transportation to Azadpur Mandi (in Delhi) was less than Rs 100 last year which has now gone up to Rs 220-230,” he said, adding that it will drastically reduce the earnings of farmers.Rotten apples are seen over a truck roof, as trucks carrying apples remain stranded along Srinagar-Jammu National Highway, in Qazigund, South Kashmir. Photo: Umar FarooqWith each passing day and the precarious state of the national highway, Kashmiri farmers and traders fear that the backlog of stranded trucks could increase if the vehicular movement on the highway wasn’t streamlined soon. “It will take at least a week of good weather to clear the backlog. If the weather gets ugly, the losses will only increase,” Basheer said.