The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) informed Parliament on Tuesday that there have been no incidents of cross-border infiltration recorded in Jammu and Kashmir in the first six months of this year, as it provided statistics on falling infiltration in the union territory, news agency ANI reported.
In response to a question from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) member of parliament Ranjanben Dhananjay Bhatt, union minister of state for home Nityanand Rai stated in a written reply in the Lok Sabha that "the approach adopted by the government of India to tackle cross-border infiltration has ensured a perceptible decline in infiltration."
The minister went on to say that the government has implemented a multi-pronged approach to combat cross-border infiltration.
"This includes tactical deployment of forces at the International Border (IB)/Line of Control (LoC), use of technology like Surveillance Cameras, Night Vision Cameras, Heat Sensing Gadgets, multi-tiered deployment along IB/LoC, border fencing, deployment of intelligence personnel to collect advance and target-oriented inputs on infiltration, ambushes and foot-patrolling by Army/Border Security Force (BSF), establishment of Border Police Posts for generating local intelligence and taking pro-active action against infiltrators," he stated.
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According to the statistics he provided in his response, there were no occurrences of cross-border infiltration in J&K as of June 30. According to the data, cross-border infiltration has decreased dramatically since 2019, when Article 370, which granted J&K some special status, was repealed and it became a union territory.
According to Rai's reply in Lok Sabha, there were 141 occurrences of cross-border infiltration in J&K in 2019, 51 in 2020, 34 in 2021, and barely 14 last year.