The Border Security Force (BSF) personnel, who are standing guard at the Integrated Check Post (ICP) in Amritsar, had to shut it down because of the Pahalgam terror attack. This happened on Thursday, April 24, 2025.
Apparently, both India and Pakistan folks were spotted heading back to their own countries on that day. The BSF decided to “scale down” the Beating Retreat ceremony that usually happens in three places along the Pakistan border in Punjab.
The Punjab frontier of the BSF stated that they were “suspending” the handshake tradition between the guards from India and Pakistan during the ceremony. They also mentioned that the border gates would remain closed during this time to show how serious they are about peace and stuff.
It seems like the people at the Attari border point were the ones affected the most. They usually have around 350-400 folks moving around, but that day it was only 125. An official at the Land Port Authority of India mentioned that 100 folks came from Pakistan, and 25 left from India.
Seems like the tension between India and Pakistan is causing some trouble for the folks traveling back and forth. After the Pahalgam attack, India made some rules banning Pakistan nationals from coming to India through the SAARC Visa Exemption Scheme. They even gave a 48-hour deadline to any Pakistani folks already in India under that visa to leave.
In the last year, around 71,563 people passed through the ICP at Attari, which is a pretty important spot for trade and passenger movement between the two countries. Despite all the drama, the BSF is still doing their daily flag-lowering ceremony for everyone to see. Seems like things are pretty tense over there, huh?
