Jammu,
The Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board will soon launch a redesigned palanquin for greater comfort of pilgrims and convenience of the palkiwallahs.

The palanquins will be comfortable, light weight, sturdier and aesthetically designed. They have been developed by a team of the Industrial Design Centre of the IIT-Bombay and the National Institute of Industrial Engineering, Mumbai, in collaboration with the shrine board.

The idea of improving the traditional palanquins was deliberated at a meeting at Raj Bhawan in December 2014 between Governor NN Vohra, who is also the Chairman of the shrine board, and R Chidambaram, Principal Scientific Adviser to the Centre.

At the meeting, it was decided that the University of Jammu shall act as the nodal point for the functioning of the Rural Technology Action Group, which with the support of the IIT-Delhi and other technology institutions would assist the shrine board to undertake varied technology upgrade tasks.

It was also decided at the meeting that the traditional palanquins shall be redesigned with the help of the IIT-Bombay. The Governor has been regularly reviewing the progress of the project to develop an improved palanquin.

In the past four years, several prototypes have been developed, trial runs have been conducted and modifications made based on the feedback provided by the palkiwallahs.

Under the aegis and support of the Rural Technology Action Group, mechanical engineering students of Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University have also been involved in the trial runs of the newly designed palanquins.