Location & Climate

Shopian or Shupiyan is a town and administrative division of the Shopian district, located in southern part of Kashmir Valley, bounded by Pulwama, Kulgam, Anantnag, and Peer Ki Gali where temperature often drops to as low as -7°c in winter, which is one of the extremely coldest towns of Jammu and Kashmir, India. The geologist Frederic Drew stated that Shopian derived its name from a distortion of word shah-payan, i.e. “royal stay”. However, the local people hold the view that Shopian was earlier named as “Shin-Van” meaning “snow forest”. The Shias have a different view, believing it was earlier inhabited by Shias so it is “Shin-Van” that is “The Forest of Shias”. Shopian is an ancient town of Kashmir and had an importance due to it being situated on the ancient imperial route, commonly known as Mughal Road, which connects Lahore and Srinagar.[4] Shopian was one out of six Wazarat Headquarters in Kashmir from 1872-1892 A.D. Shopian town is 51 kilometres (32 mi) from Srinagar and 20 kilometres (12 mi) from Pulwama at an elevation of 2,146 metres (7,041 ft) above sea level. It has decades-old road connectivity with Anantnag as well as Kulgam.