Begging for their lives, the Pakistan Rangers on Sunday made frantic calls to local BSF formations in Jammu to stop use of ‘lethal’ fire power as it was causing huge damages on their side.

In response, the BSF put retaliatory fire on hold but tension prevailed along the entire border belt. Majority of border residents living in the direct line of fire are staying away from their houses fearing fresh skirmishes in the coming days.

The BSF jawans are also maintaining tight vigil to prevent any fresh infiltration bid from the Pakistani side.

According to field reports, a Pakistan Ranger was killed in one of these ‘punitive strikes’ on Saturday.

The BSF released a 9-second thermal-imagery footage showing the destruction of a Pakistani picket across the border in retaliation to the unprovoked firing and shelling along the International Border.

According to a BSF spokesperson in Jammu, on Western borders, the befitting reply by BSF units to unprovoked shelling and firing across international boundary by Pakistan forces has forced them to plead for ceasefire.

“Today (on May 20), Pakistan Rangers called up the Jammu BSF formation and beseeched to stop firing,” he said. The officer said for the last three days, the precision fire of the BSF on Pakistani firing locations inflicted heavy losses on them.

“Yesterday, the firing from BSF troopers hit a soldier of Pakistan Rangers,” he said.

The Pakistan Rangers had first shattered peace by resorting to ‘unprovoked’ firing on BSF border outposts, possibly with a clear objective to push a group of infiltrators inside the Indian territory, he said.

At least four back-to-back infiltration bids were detected by the alert BSF jawans on the border in the last one week. In the exchange of firing, two BSF jawans attained martyrdom. Pakistan side too had suffered heavy damages in relentless ‘punitive’ strikes.

Before the arrival of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a BSF jawan constable Sita Ram Upadhayay and four civilians were killed and over a dozen others were injured in Pakistan firing on the border in RS Pura and Arnia sectors of Jammu district.

Referring to the ongoing exercise launched across Jammu frontier to detect presence of any cross border tunnel, BSF officials claimed no trans-border tunnel was found in Hiranagar sector of Kathua district after five suspected terrorists were said to have infiltrated into the Indian territory.

The suspected movement of five infiltrators was detected late on Sunday night by a BSF sentry following which massive search and cordon operations were launched to track their foot prints.

“We were working on probability. Otherwise, tunnel checking is now part of BSF’s daily operational duty,” said the officer.

“Though the initial impression we got was that some infiltrators might have crossed. We went by the past cases. However, on verification, ground search and analysis up to now, we feel that those five people (caught on thermal imagers) could have been villagers, locals or at most internal smugglers. Still nothing is ruled out. We are working on this along with other agencies too but nothing substantial has come out so far,” he said.

Courtesy: The Pioneer, Monday, 21 May 2018 | Mohit Kandhari | Jammu