In a record achievement, the Border Security Force (BSF) has recovered 69 Pakistani drones that entered Indian territory in the last 10 months of this year, foiling attempt of smugglers to smuggle narcotics, data collated by the border guarding force reveals.
Accessed by the ANI, the data points out that majority of these drones are “Made in China”, and of Quadcopter designs– which have four rotors– in different models.
As per the data, a total of 69 such drones were seized by the BSF between January 1 to October 31 this year on the Western Border of India that run through Punjab, Rajasthan and Jammu frontiers.
Of these 69 drones, 60 were seized from Punjab frontier and nine from Rajasthan frontier.
Maximum of 21 drones were seized in October only– 19 from Punjab and two from Rajasthan frontier. However, 11 drones were seized in June; seven in May; six each in February, July and September; five in August; three each in March and April; and one in January.
The data shows, there was no any drone recovery from Rajasthan frontier in January, March, April and May.
Since January 1, 2020 to October 31 this year, a total of 93 drones have been seized by the BSF. Of them, only one drone was seized from Jammu frontier in June 2020 and one in December 2021.
However, drone recoveries suddenly increased manifold in 2022 with finding of 22 from Punjab frontier. Of those 22 drones, seven were seized in December, five in November, three in October, two in March and one each in January, February, April, May and June.
A few of these drones were shot down by the BSF personnel deployed on the 3,323 km India-Pakistan border. These recoveries were made in close coordination with state police following tip off received.
Smugglers in Pakistan send these drones carrying small amount of contraband– mostly Heroin– from 500 gram to 1 kg in India crossing India-Pakistan International Border easily by flying them in the night, a BSF officer told the ANI.
“As per the laid down drill, BSF troops immediately reacts based on inputs and launch search operation in fields ahead of Border fencing to recover the drones,” said the officer.
The data shows that the Pakistani smugglers especially chose India’s Punjab frontier to smuggle narcotics using drone and the recoveries of these Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) were made from Tarn Taran, Amritsar, Ferozpur, Gurdaspur and Abohar districts.