New Delhi, Apr 24: The Border Security Force (BSF) on Thursday said it has “scaled down” the retreat ceremony held at Attari, Hussainiwala and Sadki along the India-Pakistan border in Punjab in the wake of the Pahalgam terrorist attack.
The BSF’s Punjab frontier, which guards 532 km of this front out of the total 2,200 km, said in a statement that as part of this “calibrated decision”, it was suspending the symbolic handshake of the Indian guard commander with the counterpart and the border gates will remain closed during the ceremony.
These steps, it said, reflected “India’s serious concern over cross-border hostilities and reaffirms that peace and provocation cannot coexist”.
Officials said all other drills will continue and common people will be allowed to witness this daily flag-lowering ceremony.
Twenty-six men, mostly tourists and including a Nepalese citizen, were gunned down in cold blood in a terrorist attack that took place in Jammu and Kashmir’s tourist location of Pahalgam on Tuesday.
India has launched a diplomatic offensive against Pakistan and taken a number of counter-measures linking these attacks to the neighbouring country.
The biggest event takes place at the Attari border front, a joint or integrated land border check post. It is located about 26 km from Amritsar.
Hundreds of domestic visitors, foreign tourists and locals visit the Attari border every day to watch the daily flag-lowering and retreat ceremony conducted in a synchronised fashion by smartly-dressed BSF personnel along with their counterparts Pakistan Rangers.
The border on the Pakistani side is known as Wagah.
Similar but smaller ceremonies take place at Hussainiwala (Ferozepur district) and Sadki (Abohar district).
India and Pakistan have been traditionally hosting the evening flag-lowering ceremonies at the Attari-Wagah border since 1959 and the event is attended by a huge number of people from both countries on their respective sides. The ceremony goes on for 45-50 minutes. (PTI)
