India Protests To Pakistan Over Border Crossing And Blames Narcotics Networks

India summoned the senior-most Pakistani diplomat in New Delhi on Saturday to protest against what it called the continued facilitation of illegal cross-border infiltration, and dismissed Pakistani allegations about an incident on the Punjab border two days earlier.

File Photo: BSF India

The Ministry of External Affairs said it had called in the Chargé d'Affaires of the Pakistan High Commission and lodged a strong protest. It described Pakistan's claims over the 2 October incident in the Ferozepur sector as "baseless and motivated".

According to the ministry's account, three people crossed into Indian territory and kept moving towards the border fence after repeated warnings from the Border Security Force to turn back. "The BSF was compelled to engage them for posing an imminent security threat," the ministry said in its statement.

It placed the episode within what it called a wider pattern. "This incident highlights a clear pattern of repeated cross-border movement by armed narcotics syndicates operating from Pakistan," the statement said, adding that Islamabad had been urged to investigate such infiltration and drug smuggling, along with "the complicity of Pakistan Border Guarding forces therein", and to take remedial measures.

Pakistan was also asked to respect the sanctity of the International Border, observe the bilateral arrangements that govern it, direct its forces to prevent unauthorised movement from its side, and ensure such incidents do not recur.

The Ferozepur sector lies on the stretch of the India-Pakistan frontier running through Punjab, which is the International Border proper and legally distinct from the Line of Control. The Border Security Force guards it. The Punjab stretch has for several years been the focus of Indian concern over narcotics and weapons being pushed across, latterly by drone, and the ministry's framing of this protest around smuggling networks rather than militancy reflects that.

The protest was delivered to a chargé d'affaires rather than a high commissioner because neither country has had an envoy of that rank in the other's capital since 2019, when ties were downgraded. The two missions have since operated at a reduced level, and summoning the chargé d'affaires has become the standard channel for protests of this kind.