250 goats didn’t cross over to Pakistan from Jaisalmer: BSF

JAISALMER: The case of around 250 goats of cattle raisers of Pochina village in Jaisalmer district going to Pakistan from shifting dunes area in Barmer is flaring up as BSF has denied that goats have gone from their area and no fence is in bad shape. A flag meeting with Pakistan was held on Tuesday in which the neighbouring country denied any such incident.
After giving memorandum to Jaisalmer district collector, the villagers were going to Barmer to meet the BSF DIG on Wednesday and request him for action.
Now, BSF has banned grazing of cattle near the international border. BSF has apprehensions that the facility could be misused by few cattle raisers who could support undesired activities across the border, etc.
It is known that the cattle raisers of Pochina and other villages on Monday gave a memorandum to the Jaisalmer district collector and cabinet minister Saleh Mohammad in which they had demanded to return around 250 goats that went to Pakistan from India owing to broken and buried fencing of BSF BOP Seema & DKT in shifting sand dunes area in Sundara of Barmer and be given compensation. But, BSF has refuted the claims.
BSF official spokesperson of Gujrat Frontier said no such incident as claimed has occurred, i.e., neither the border fence in “Sundara AOR” has broken down nor any Indian goat has landed in Pakistan. The single-layer border fence amidst shifting sand dunes remains under 24x7 surveillance on account of its vulnerability. As such, feasibility of any such incident happening and that too going unnoticed, is all together ruled out. He said the flag meeting with Pakistan took place on Tuesday. Pakistan has said that the claim of goats wandering there is totally wrong. There is no such evidence.
He said the claimant had been informed by the Company Commander “Sundara AOR” that his contention regarding crossing over of Indian goats to Pak had been verified with due diligence and existing procedure involving border guarding forces of both the countries and no such evidence has been found to substantiate the happening of the reported incident. No footprints of any thing has been seen.
District collector Aashish Modi said that villagers had come to him and told about their goats going to Pakistan and submitted memorandum. In this regard he spoke to BSF Jaisalmer sector south DIG Rajesh Kumar who said he cannot confirm and it is not possible at his level.
The district collector said that in this regard he is talking to Barmer sector officers whether it is possible or not.
On the other hand, cattle raisers Balveer Singh Pochina and Jethu Singh said that till now they have not got any positive reply. They are going to meet Barmer sector BSF DIG on Wednesday.