In a pre-dawn attack on January 2, a group of heavily- armed Pakistani terrorists struck at Punjab's Pathankot Air Force base. (File photograph)
The Army is conducting an extensive search in thick sugarcane fields in a village in Punjab's Gurdaspur, where locals had reported yesterday that two men dressed in fatigues were acting suspiciously.
Pandher village is near the Tibri cantonment area. A search yesterday had revealed no anomaly.
The police said that the Army is using armoured vehicles today to comb the fields. The area has been evacuated, with markets shut and villagers asked to stay indoors.
Gurdaspur is near the border with Pakistan and just 40 km away from Pathankot, where six terrorists attacked an air force base on last Saturday.
The Pakistani terrorists were killed in an intense military operation that lasted three-and-a-half days. Seven security personnel were martyred and another 20 were injured.
A Gurdaspur police officer has said that less than two days before the terror attack, he was on way back from Pathankot when he was abducted along with his cook and a friend by the Pakistani terrorists, who hijacked his car and snatched his cellphones.
The terrorists used the car to reach Pathankot and abandoned it near the air base, which they entered in two groups.
The policeman, Salwinder Singh, had lodged a complaint, but it was treated as a case of armed robbery for hours. Interrogators from the National Investigating Agency who have spoken with Mr Singh say his account of his abduction and what followed has revealed deep inconsistencies.