Pathankot: BSF kills one alleged intruder

The body lay on the other side of the Indian fence for several hours before the BSF went up and examined it.

BSF officials said they were apprehensive of a booby-trap, similar to the one that killed NSG Lt. Col Niranjan.

The body has been handed over to the local police.

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Later in the day, BSF officials held a flag meeting with the Pakistani Rangers during which the latter first declared that the dead man was not a Pakistani national but later said they would check in the neighbouring villages if his description matched with that of any local resident who was missing.

“So another flag meeting may be held tomorrow to establish the identity of the intruder,” said a BSF official.

BSF Punjab Frontier Inspector General of Police Anil Paliwal said three infiltrators opened fire in an attempt to cross over to India from Jalalabad side of Pakistan around 6:40 am.

Tash checkpost of BSF is just opposite the Pakistani Rangers’ Jalalabad check post. The area where the firing incident took place falls falls between two gaps in the fencing on Ravi river, including the one in Bamiyal, from where terrorists allegedly infiltrated to carry out the Pathankot terror attack.

On January 8, a labourer has claimed to have seen two suspicious men near Tash checkpost, but BSF did not say if they investigated that sighting and if it was linked to the incident in the early hours of Thursday.

“BSF personnel observed three Pakistani intruders approaching from Pakistan side towards Border Security Fence around 6:40 am. BSF sentry challenged the intruders but they did not pay heed and continued with their aggressive posture and opened fire on BSF troops. Sensing danger to his life and to check further misadventure of intruders, BSF sentry fired on intruders in self-defence. Resultantly, one Pakistani intruder got interdicted and two others managed to escape taking advantage of foggy weather and undulating ground. During search of the area, body of one unidentified Pakistani intruder was found ahead of Border Security Fence. The matter is being investigated with the help of other sister agencies,” said Paliwal in his statement.

Intelligence sources said that while the evidence suggests that the man was trying to enter Indian territory, his purpose could not be stated with certainty.

BSF, however, said the manner of attempted entry pointed to terrorists.

“The design of attack suggests that he was linked with terrorist organisations.”

BSF have previously killed alleged drug smugglers in such encounters.

In separate incidents in 2015, BSF had shot down three Pakistani intruders while they were trying to infiltrate the border.

But BSF officials are drawing similarities between Thursday’s incident and another in 2010 when two terrorists had tried in a similar manner to enter India from the BSF “symbol” forward checkpost. They had then managed to enter Indian territory by damaging a part of the fencing.

BSF had alerted local police and a search operation was launched. Two days later, both terrorists attacked a police party of 18 personnel near cremation ground of the Ratwaara village and killed two policemen before being killed in cross-firing.

The BSF forward “symbol” check post is around 20 km from the Tash checkpost.