The sudden spurt comes as a surprise as things had been extraordinarily peaceful during the first three months of the year with just 17 terrorists managing to infiltrate into the country. This, among other things had formed the basis for PDP’s demand to reduce troops in the Valley.

The latest assessment shows that infiltration is on a three-year high with 96 terrorists crossing over till April, 2007 as against 75 in 2006 and 37 in 2005. However, what has surprised the Army is a huge surge in the number of infiltration attempts in the month of April. Over 82 attempts were made to push terrorists into this side of the border this April as against 2006 when 43 incidents were reported.

“It appears as if they had been regrouping and waiting for a chance to cross the border. This appears to be timed with some pressure to withdraw troops,” a senior official said. He added that a similar tactic was used during the Kargil war to flood the country with infiltrators while forces were engaged elsewhere.

The assessment figures, drawn up from intelligence inputs as well as communication intercepts, pertain to not only LoC violations but also to infiltration from other places like the coastline, Nepal and Bangladesh.

These figures were discussed during a meeting on reduction of troops chaired by Defence Secretary Shekhar Dutt on Tuesday.

The armed forces cited the spurt in infiltration at the first sign of thaw from India as a sign of things to come if troop levels were reduced. The Congress-led Jammu and Kashmir Government is understood to have conveyed during the meeting that any reduction in security forces was not possible in the near future.

Infiltration bid foiled

JAMMU: The Army foiled an infiltration attempt on Friday from across the Line of Control (LoC) in Sunderbani area of Rajouri district of the state. Sources said the Army noticed some movement near the LoC at Chakla border outpost in Sunderbani area at around 2 am and opened fire. Following the firing, six infiltrators fled back to Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK) leaving behind rucksacks containing arms and ammunition.

Defence Spokesman Colonel S D Goswami said that the troops seized six AK rifles, two Thuraya sets, two ICON radio sets, one wire-cutter, two binoculars and two maps from the spot. They added that the infiltration attempts from across the borders are continuing even though there is a ceasefire in the region since 2003.