Search operation on in Gurdaspur border belt; BSF foils infiltration

Gurdaspur (Punjab):  A search operation was launched in the border belt of Gurdaspur district of north Punjab on Monday morning following an unsuccessful infiltration bid along the international border with Pakistan. Punjab Police sources said the search operation was being conducted in villages around Chakri border out post (BoP), 30 km from here, following the movement of suspected persons in the area. Firing was reported at the Chakri BoP of BSF along the international border with Pakistan early on Monday as Border Security Force troopers repulsed an intrusion bid by 8-10 people in the counter offensive. According to the sources, the firing started around 2 a.m. after the alert troopers, using Hand Held Thermal Imagers (HHTI), noticed movement of 8-10 people near the international border. The intruders, who had crossed the border but were behind the barbed wire fencing, were challenged. "They fired at the BSF post. Our troopers immediately retaliated the firing. The intruders retreated back to Pakistan. A search operation has been launched in the area today (Monday) morning," a BSF official said. Tension has been escalated between India and Pakistan following the recent terror attacks in Jammu and Kashmir and the surgical strikes carried out by the Indian Army across the Line of Control (LoC) to destroy terror launch pads in Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK). Nearly 1,000 villages in six border districts of Punjab, located within 10 km from the IB, have been ordered to be evacuated following the tension between the neighbouring nations. The evacuation was ordered as a preventive measure. Terrorists, suspected to be from Pakistan, had attacked the frontier Indian Air Force (IAF) base in Pathankot town of Punjab on January 2 this year, leaving seven security personnel dead. The Pathankot attack was preceded by a terror attack by Pakistani terrorists in Dinanagar town of Gurdaspur district on July 27 last year.