Top officials of security agencies meet
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 5: Top officers of Army, CRPF, NDRF and Police from Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Punjab held joint meeting of three States/Union Territory at Pathankot to review security preparedness and coordination.
The meeting was presided over by General Officer Commanding (GOC) 9 Corps, headquartered at Yol Cantonment in Himachal Pradesh, Lt Gen Pushpendera Singh.
Additional Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab Mr Chawla, Himachal Pradesh Inspector General of Police (IGP) Sumedha Dwivedi and DIG Jammu-Samba-Kathua Range Shakti Pathak represented police of three States/UT at the meeting.
Besides them, Deputy Commissioners/Additional Deputy Commissioners and SSPs of Hoshiarpur, Pathankot, Gurdaspur in Punjab; Samba and Kathua in Jammu and Kangra in Himachal Pradesh; and senior officers from Army, CRPF and NDRF were also present, the officials said.
The meeting comes at a time when militant activities have shown slight increase in parts of Jammu as well as Punjab.
“Focus was also on drone activities in the areas falling close to the International Border in Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts of Jammu region and Punjab,” they said.
Coordination among security agencies operating in Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Punjab was high on agenda, they said, adding all the agencies of three States/UT agreed to share credible information about militants, drone activities and narcotics smuggling etc.
Narco smuggling, as per the sources, has become major challenge in Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab though it has also spread in Himachal but the menace there was not to the extent as witnessed in JK and Punjab, the officials said.
They added that several decisions were taken at the joint meeting pertaining to tackling the challenges posed by militancy, narco-terror, drone activities and inter-state smuggling and the officers decided to have regular interactions, whenever required.
It may be mentioned here that there have been reports that the militants from Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir might have certain connections but, as per sources, no such evidence has been gathered.
However, there were reports that narco smugglers of J&K and Punjab definitely have links with each other and were involved in supply of narcotics from one place to another.
All three States/UT will be sharing information on narcotics smuggling as there have been reports that proceeds generated from drugs are being used for funding terrorism by the militant commanders at the behest of Pakistan, the officials said.
Follow our WhatsApp channel
