The BSF has directed its battalion commanders to spend at least 25 nights in a month at a forward post along the India-Pakistan International Border (IB) in Jammu as part of its renewed efforts to fortify the ‘anti-infiltration’ grid in this region, official sources said Tuesday.
The commandants and their second-in-command officers havebeen asked to strictly follow the directive and monitor their units to check”each and every” movement along this front, which is highly sensitiveand vulnerable from the point of infiltration from the Pakistani soil andunprovoked firing incidents.
A directive, accessed by PTI, said the senior commanders ofthe force “have taken a serious view on inadequate night halts”undertaken by the field commanders in the recent past and hence they have beenasked to now spend “at least” 25 night stops at border posts.
BSF officers in the Punjab frontier have also been asked toundertake similar measures.
This order for night halt of battalion commanders in forwardareas are for sometime. The strategy can be modified as per the prevailingsituation, a senior official said.
The battalion in-charges have also been asked to set up atactical base or operational centre at one of the forward locations along theJammu frontier to ensure that there is no let up in security and an effectivevigil is maintained.
The recent order is being seen in the light of a massiveexercise undertaken by the Border Security Force to fortify the’anti-infiltration grid’ along the Pakistan border in Punjab and Jammu bymobilising its entire senior field brass, troops and machinery.
The operation, code named ‘Sudarshan’, was launched betweenJuly 1-15 and will cover the entire over 1,000-kms length of the IB in the twostates.While Jammu shares about 485-kms border withPakistan, about 553-kms of the front runs along Punjab. Further, it runs downtowards Rajasthan and Gujarat on India’s western flank.