BSF seizes 17 packets of heroin from Indo-Pak border

The Border Security Force (BSF) seized 17 packets of heroin worth $ 850 million dollars in the international market on Sunday at Amritsar's Daoke border outpost area which is near the India-Pakistan international border.

In the early hours of the morning at around 4:30 am, BSF soldiers detected suspicious movement of smugglers who were trying to insert a long plastic pipe in the border security fence. The BSF challenged them to stop. In an act of retaliation, the smugglers fired upon the forces.

In order to prevent the smugglers from succeeding, the BSF troops returned the fire. The dense fog in the area helped the smugglers to escape.

Ajay Kumar Tomar, Inspector General of BSF, Punjab Frontier, gave a list of the various items recovered after a thorough inspection of the area.

"One pipe had been installed by the smugglers. The pipe and the surrounding area were checked. We recovered 17 packets of heroin from there. Apart from this, one pistol, one magazine and it had rounds, a country made revolver, one mobile phone and one sim card were recovered," he said.

According to an official release, these items were recovered at a distance of 250 metres from International Boundary in Indian Territory near the border security fence.

BSF has beefed up security in the area, keeping in mind the winter season and the dense fog enveloping the northern area that assists the illegal operations.

Tomar said that smugglers take advantage of such weather conditions.

"It is the winter season now. There is fog during early morning in the surrounding border areas. There are farms all around. This serves as an opportunity for the smugglers and they take advantage of it. Keeping this in mind, BSF has launched Operation Alert in this area" he said.

In 2013, BSF had successfully prevented the smuggling of over 322 kilograms of heroin and other ammunition into the country.