Anxiety in Fazilka, Ferozepur, though no major evacuation

FEROZEPUR/FAZILKA: There was anxiety but no major evacuation in the border villages of Ferozepur and Fazilka on Thursday when tension between India and Pakistan escalated.

Announcements being made from the village gurdwaras and temples were pressing people to be at least 10 kilometres from the Pakistan border. The administration has created 25 rehabilitation camps for border villagers.

The warnings had little effect. In most border villages, not many people had moved out till the filing of this report. “How can we leave our ripe crop. We’ll be ruined,” Ferozepur farmer Amb Singh said. “We’ll decide to move or not only after harvest.”

More police contingents moved into Ferozepur and Fazilka villages. “We have received ₹1 crore from the state government for the rehabilitation centres,” said Ferozepur deputy commissioner DPS Kharbanda. In Fazilka, people have started coming to the 26 rehabilitation camps outside the 10-km radius of the Pakistan border. “So far, we have nothing to panic,” said DC Isha Kalia.

Fazilka’s Jodhawalan and Tahliwala villages are just a kilometre from the Radcliffe Line. Jasbir Singh of Tahliwala, 15 km from Jalalabad, said schools had been shut and villagers called early from their fields falling in no man’s land.

Another resident, Surjeet, said BSF officials asked them to leave fields in the afternoon and border gates were closed.