Pathankot strike could have been averted: J&K Guv

The  Pathankot terror strike could have been prevented had lessons been learnt from previous such attacks with focus on securing the country's border with Pakistan, which is not yet "well guarded", J&K Governor NN Vohra said on Tuesday.

Highlighting infiltrations by terror groups through the International Border (IB), including the recent attack on Pathankot airbase, Vohra said the Border Security Force (BSF) with its limited capacities cannot guard the IB (in J&K and Punjab) which is a long stretch of over 200 to 250 km.

The Governor who was in the national Capital to deliver a key note address on the seventh National Investigation Agency (NIA) day, noted that the five-six terror attacks, which took place from September 2013 onwards via Kathua through the IB, part of which falls in J&K, should have been followed up as closely as the Pathankot attack.

He said the attack on Dina Nagar police station in Gurdaspur could have been avoided, if the previous terror attacks were subjected to a tight investigation. "...and if Dinanagar would have been properly investigated, Pathankot, I am sure would have been almost impossible because we would have been able to know the routes taken by the terror groups to infiltrate the IB. I also hold very strongly that IB is not well guarded," said Vohra.

The Governor, who has also served as Union Home and Defence Secretary, besides Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister in 1997, maintained that he had informed the centre about it.

"I think there are issues...but we need to do much more. The BSF, with its present capacities, cannot safeguard the International Border , which is a long stretch of over 200 to 250 km almost including the border in Punjab. It is a difficult area and we need to look at that," Vohra reiterated.

He was replying to a question over the reluctance of state governments in handing over terror cases to central probe agencies. 

The Punjab government had refused to hand over the Dina Nagar police station attack probe to the National Investigation Agency.