The National Security Guard (NSG) has deployed anti-drone systems at Srinagar and Jammu air force stations to counter any drone attacks, the Director General of specialized commando force – M A Ganapathy said on Saturday.

People familiar with the development said that the NSG’s anti-drone measures have been successful so far as they have managed to detect a few drones in last few months and alert the relevant agencies on time.

The development comes in the backdrop of a twin-drone attack at the Jammu Air Force Station on June 27, in which two unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) travelled from across the border and dropped two 3 kg to 5 kg improvised explosive devices (IEDs) at the air facility, damaging a portion of the building. An offshoot of Lashkar-e-Taiba – The Resistance Front (TRF) – has been found to be involved in the drone attack and the case is being investigated by the National Investigation Agency (NIA).

Since then, the government has had a series of meetings with various agencies, private players, Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) etc to have robust anti-drone systems across the western border.

Both Srinagar and Jammu Indian Air Force (IAF) stations are categorized as ‘sensitive’ installations.

Ganapathy, during the 37th raising day function of NSG on Saturday, said that the federal counter-terrorist and counter-hijack commando force is enhancing its counter-terrorism profile and preparing itself to meet emerging security challenges.

“The NSG has been deployed at the Srinagar and Jammu IAF stations to provide security cover to the facilities against drone attacks and this system is working successfully,” he said.

People cited above said the deployment of this system will continue till full-fledged counter-drone weapons and gadgets are deployed at these two bases by the government.

He said the NSG has an array of anti-drone equipment, radars, jammers and drone killer guns that essentially work for perimeter security.

The DG further said that soon after the drone attack on the Jammu IAF base, an NSG ‘technical surveillance’ team was sent to the station which deployed its equipment there and the arrangement was stationed at the base.

Ganapathy added that the NSG’s bomb disposal expert team has also managed to successfully intercept ‘tiffin bombs’ dropped from across the border.

Indian agencies have noted that a large number of drones are being used by Pakistan army and terrorist groups to drop tiffin bombs into Indian territory, which are then picked up by the sleeper cells or over ground workers (OGWs) of the outfits.

The NIA is already probing the dropping of several tiffin bomb incidents in Punjab. As reported by HT on August 20, the federal anti-terror probe agency filed a case to investigate the delivery of a sophisticated tiffin bomb along with hand grenades and 100 pistol cartridges using a drone by Pakistan backed Khalistani terrorists at Daleke village in Lopoke sub-division of Amritsar district on August 9.

Minister of state for home affairs, Nityanand Rai, who was present at the NSG raising day as chief guest, lauded the commando force, known as ‘Black Cats’, for its operations and said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has brought in an independent security policy for the country.

The NSG was raised as a federal counter-terrorist force in 1984 to undertake surgical commando operations to neutralise terrorist and hijack threats.

It is also a special squad that provides armed security cover to at least 13 high-risk VIPs at present.

The NSG has five hubs in the country, apart from its main garrison in Delhi, and in each of them, a team of commandos is stationed in readiness 24x7 to respond to any threat situation within a 30-minute mobilisation timeframe. The five NSG hubs or bases are located in Gandhinagar, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Chennai and they were created post the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.