Hours after the Indian Army carried out surgical strikes in POK (Pakistan-occupied Kashmir) to destroy terror launch pads, residents of border villages in Jammu & Kashmir and Punjab claim to have received dozens of telephone calls from Pakistan abusing the receiver or pretending to be senior army officers.
One such call receiver was Babhishan Singh of Malpur village in Akhnoor sector, Jammu, who is also a village headman.
Babhishan claims that the caller had introduced himself as a senior army officer from Delhi headquarters.
Singh did not suspect the caller as the call was made using Indian SIM card.
He initially talked about the evacuation of people after the tensions grew on the border, but when he started inquiring about the movement of forces, Babhishan Singh informed the police.
The matter was handed over to the army authorities, who traced the caller based in Pakistan.
The authorities have not revealed the numbers, but, investigations revealed that similar calls were reportedly made to people in Punjab.
Most of the callers had asked about the movement of the Indian security forces, the villagers claim.
Not only in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir, but the phone calls believed to be made by ISI spies had also used Indian SIM cards to call people in Ladakh.
Hardeep Singh Dhillon, ADGP Law and Order, Punjab Police, said: “We have found Pakistan mobile phone signals between three to five kilometres inside India (Punjab). Efforts are being used to jam the signals by installing jammers near the borders in Punjab.”
Sanjay Puri, a resident of Pathankot, claims to have been abused by the caller, when he refused to give details.
Indian authorities claim that this is the new modus operandi adopted by the enemy to get information on military.
SPIES ON PROWL ::
Indian security agencies have been on alert, ever since it was revealed that Indian Mobile Phone SIM cards were used to speak to people living on borders, to get secret information about army installations and deployment.
The authorities had recently launched a drive to make people aware, so that strategic information was not leaked unknowingly.
The army authorities have prohibited people from clicking photos of army vehicles and establishments including border out posts.
The BSF even refused permission to the television crews to shoot on border areas, which have been divided into sensitive and
hypersensitive zones.
“Using Indian SIM cards to communicate is the latest method adopted by the ISI, terrorists and spies. But technology has made it possible to trace the location of the caller. All callers were traced in Pakistan,” a senior Army officer requesting anonymity told Mail Today.
How Pakistan spies, ISI or terrorists accessed Indian Mobile Phone SIM Cards could be a matter of investigation for Indian security agencies, it has also left them worried since the SIM cards have been used by anti-social elements to elicit secret information.
Sources claim the SIM cards were first registered using fake IDs in India, and then were allegedly used to connect with the terrorist outfits.
The Samjhauta Express or the Thar Express is allegedly used to send and receive SIM cards as the authorities rarely frisk passengers for SIM cards.
GOLDMINE FOR SIM ::
Pakistan has been a veritable goldmine for the unverified mobile SIM cards for terror outfits and drug smugglers.
According to an estimate, more than 50 million unverified SIM cards were in use in Pakistan, when the Taliban had killed 150 people including 134 school children in Peshawar on December 16, 2014.
It is also reported that only 10 percent of total mobile phone users in Pakistan are post paid customers.
Pakistan’s Ministry of Information Technology (MoIT) and Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), which had launched a verification drive after the Peshawar school terror strike, had blocked 25 million sim cards in April 2015.
Sources claim that half of the unverified SIM cards are still active and may be openly used by the terrorists and smugglers.
The mobile phones which were used by the terrorists to attack Peshawar school were issued on the basis of a fake identity.
Highly placed sources said hundreds of Pakistan mobile SIM cards were active along the Indo-Pak international border.
BSF sources estimate the number of active Pak SIM cards near the border as around 150.
It is worth mentioning here that the Indians residing near the borders, rarely use Indian mobile network connections due to weak signal and poor connectivity.
That’s why Indian smugglers, gangsters and spies have been found using Pakistan SIM cards to communicate to the Pakistan based drug lords or the terror networks.
On October 21, Jammu police had recovered two Pakistani SIM cards along with a map showing the deployment of security forces from a Pakistani spy identified as Bodhraj,who is a resident of Arnia sector and was arrested in Sambha sector.
On January 4, 2016 a Pakistan SIM card was recovered from the possession of three drug smugglers Gurjant Singh, Sandip Singh and Jatinder Singh in Mohali, Punjab.
Dozens of Pakistan SIM cards were recovered previously from drug smugglers and spies, but the authorities have no details about their operators or its actual owners.
POWERFUL SIGNALS ::
As the population of mobile users in Pakistan’s major towns, located close to the International Border has gone up, the mobile operators have installed powerful signals in Lahore,Islamabad, Sialkot.
Besides the civil mobile network, Pakistan Army Corps of Signals has also strengthened its network along the border.
Sources said Pakistan Rangers and Army also use common network operators for infiltration and spying activities.
As compared to the Pakistan’s mobile network along the International Border, the signals of Indian mobile phone operators are very weak.
While Indian mobile phones stop working a few kilometres near the border, Pakistan mobile phone signals are so powerful that they can be accessed up to five kilometres.