New guidelines for BSF, Army

Ajay Banerjee

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 29

The Gurdaspur terror incident has forced New Delhi to rethink on deployment of forces in the border areas.

A detailed plan with changed standard operating procedures (SOPs) for the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Indian Army is being prepared to ramp up security along the border. The BSF is drawing up its plan while the Indian Army has already issued an alert to its units following an assessment of threat.

Sources said this would include new electronic methods of detecting infiltration at the international borders along the riverine segments which did not have a fence. The existing method of Indian security agencies patrolling the rivers on boats makes the personnel vulnerable to attacks from well-armed terrorists who could be on the other side of the river. The monsoon turns the rivers into torrents and boats at times land up in Pakistan.

As off now, sources said, the locations of the Army’s units based in the lower hills of Punjab and J&K are under threat. An analysis has been made that Mamum (Pathankot) based 29 Division, the Jammu-based 26 Division and their units that dot the landscape have been told to be on alert as the units could be under attack. In December last year an Army camp in Uri had come under attack and 11 soldiers had died.