Amarnath Yatra ends as the Chhari Mubarak reaches the cave on Raksha Bandhan

The 2026 Amarnath Yatra closed on Friday when the Chhari Mubarak, the holy mace of Shiva, reached the cave at 3,880 metres and the last puja of the season was held on Raksha Bandhan. Mahant Deependra Giri, custodian of the mace, led the morning prayers. Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha performed the Samapan Puja and thanked security units, residents and volunteers.

The Shri Amarnath Ji Shrine Board, which Sinha chairs, said more than 4.8 lakh pilgrims used the Pahalgam and Baltal routes over 57 days. The board also said the yatra ended without a terror incident on the tracks. Forty-two pilgrims died of natural causes, most of them from high-altitude sickness or cardiac failure.

The formal end at the cave is not the last ritual. The mace will travel back through Panchtarni, Sheshnag and Chandanwari. Visarjan in the Lidder at Pahalgam is scheduled for 30 August, with a feast for sadhus on the riverbank.

The week the tracks closed

Movement from both base camps stopped after 9 August when rain, cloudbursts and landslides cut the paths. Crews repaired the damaged stretches before the last groups and the Chhari party moved again. That pause sits inside the 57-day count. It is the operational fact that separated this year from a clean calendar.

The Chhari left Srinagar in the last week of the yatra and stopped for prayers at Martand, Sarbal, Pahalgam, Chandanwari, Sheshnag and Panchtarni before the 28 August cave puja. The people who walk with the mace are a smaller, ritual group. The 4.8 lakh figure is the season total on both routes, not the Friday crowd inside the cave.

Sinha's presence at the Samapan Puja is now part of the annual script. The Lieutenant Governor chairs the board that sets the dates, the medical plan and the camp layout. His thanks to local residents is also part of that script. The numbers that can be checked are the pilgrim count, the 42 medical deaths, the 9 August halt and the 30 August visarjan date.

What the season leaves behind

A yatra without a militant strike is a security result. It is not the same as a yatra without deaths. Forty-two medical fatalities in 57 days is the figure the health plan has to answer. Cardiac screening at the base camps and oxygen points on the climb are the tools the board already names. The death count says those tools still miss people who should not have been on the last 3,000 metres.

Pahalgam and Baltal will now shed the seasonal camps. Pony owners, porters and shopkeepers lose the daily queue. The tracks that were rebuilt after 9 August will take winter weather before the next file is opened. The board will publish a fuller after-action note in the usual way. Until that note appears, Friday's facts are the arrival of the mace, the last puja, 4.8 lakh pilgrims, 42 dead from illness, and a river date on 30 August.