The sleepy border town of Punjab was abuzz over the visit of Pakistan's Joint Investigation Team (JIT) to carry out a first-of-its-kind terror probe at the IAF base with locals wanting to catch a sight of the "ISI agent" and his fellow sleuths from across the border.
After newspapers and television channels flashed stories about the visit of the five-member JIT, which also included an official of the ISI, residents of this frontier town were either glued to the TV for information on the movement of the team or decided to make a trip "as close as possible" to the Air Force base.
He said though news reports talked about the arrival of the Pakistani team along with Indian NIA officials as part of the probe on the terror attack on the forward air base early this year, there was no clarity as to when and how they would be travelling.
"There are reports that the Pakistani officials will be taken to the border area in Bamiyal near here from where it is suspected that the terrorists sneaked in to launch the attack on January 1-2. People have lined up the approach road to at least catch a glimpse of the convoy and capture it on their smartphones," Umesh Bhatia, a local medical student said.
The visiting Pakistani JIT, which landed 500 km away in Delhi yesterday, is led by Punjab's Counter Terrorism Department (CTD), Additional Inspector General of Police Muhammad Tahir Rai and has ISI's Lt Col Tanvir Ahmed, Lahore's Deputy Director General Intelligence Bureau Mohammad Azim Arshad, Military Intelligence Lt Col Irfan Mirza and Gujaranwala CTD Investigating Officer Shahid Tanveer.
