CHANDIGARH: A high alert has been sounded in the border police districts of Pathankot, Gurdaspur and Batala in Punjab after four men snatched an Toyota Innova on Tuesday night from near Madhopur on Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir border.
Sources said that all the four accused had hired the taxi from Jammu to Amritsar in Punjab and had dinner at a restaurant near Samba in Jammu where they picked up a quarrel with the owner. After leaving the restaurant, one of the accused complained of vomiting and the driver stopped the vehicle near Madhopur in Punjab and then another accused pointed a gun at the driver, Raj Kumar, and pushed him out of the vehicle.
Raj Kumar then rang up the police control room, following which Senior Superintendent of Police of Pathankot Vivek Sheel Soni and other senior police officials reached the spot. Within an hour of the incident, nine check posts were set-up up on the Pathankot-Gurdaspur-Batala-Amritsar highway. Punjab Police has dispatched a team to Sambha in Jammu. The hotel owner was also questioned.
Inspector General of Police (Border Range) Surinder Pal Singh Parmar did not rule out a terror angle and said a massive manhunt has been launched to nab the accused. “We are not in a position to take any risks, especially after the January 2016 terror attack on the Pathankot Air Force station. We have formed six teams and information has been sought from the two toll barriers on the Gurdaspur-Pathankot and Batala-Amritsar highways,” Singh said. In 2016, terrorists launched attacks on the Pathankot Air base after snatching a Punjab police officer’s car to get to the air base.