Vigil enhanced at India-Pakistan border following Punjab terror attack: Rajnath

“Security forces have moved”.

“Yes there have been reports that there was a terror attack at the Punjab border (town) but as of now there is no information regarding hostages being held”.

No one has been taken hostage in the militant attack at Punjab’s Dinanagar town, said union minister Kirren Rijiju on Monday.

Such attacks are relatively common in the disputed Kashmir region, which is divided between India and Pakistan, but unusual in neighbouring Punjab. The Home Minister said the central government is monitoring the situation and he was confident that the situation would be brought under control.

Sandwiched between two rivers, Gurdaspur is Punjab state’s northernmost district, and is close to Pakistan. Four civilians have also sustained injuries.

Deputy police commissioner Abhinav Trikha said the attackers appeared to be holed up in the residential quarters of the police station and were “firing continuously”. A suspected militant was also killed, but his body had not yet been recovered, another official said.

Television footage showed the auto with its windshield peppered with bullet holes, and broken glass and bullet casings on the passenger seat.

“This is a zone which has been vulnerable for quite some time”.

“This is probably linked to the movement of the 1990s, these are the Khalistanis who have done this”. That is who I assume would be behind it eventually. “Directions would have come from there”, said Ajai Sahni, executive director of the Institute for Conflict Management in New Delhi. “You can’t support a movement that doesn’t exist on the ground (in India)”.

The incident comes weeks after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif spoke for about an hour during a summit in Russian Federation, raising hopes of an improvement in perennially hard relations.