Operation launched to rescue trapped shepherds in Ladakh

Leh, Feb 15 (PTI) Border guarding force ITBP has launched a rescue operation to bring back about 27 shepherds who have been trapped in the icy heights along the Sino-Indian frontier. The operation, along Hanley and Zansar posts, is being conducted at an altitude of 15000-feet after the force was sent an SOS by the village sarpanch than these 'riboos' (shepherds) and about 1000 sheep were stranded in the upper reaches of the mountain ranges and they have lost all contact with them. The force has sent a 29-member team for the rescue operation after, in a similar exercise, twenty shepherds were rescued in the same area yesterday. The Ladakh area in Jammu and Kashmir has been receiving heavy snowfall for the last few days and undertaking such operations has become very challenging, a senior Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) official said. PTI NES RT