Attari (Punjab): It is a 25-minute spectacle that gets your heart and adrenalin pumping.
Songs blaring on powerful speakers, enthusiastic people wearing patriotism on their sleeves, jingoistic slogan-shouting and the grand finale — the foot-thumping by troopers of the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Pakistan Rangers, the bodily gestures and the glares — all are part of the the Retreat ceremony that marks the lowering of the national flags at sunset and closure of the gates for the night at the Attari-Wagah joint check post on the border between India and Pakistan.
With thousands of spectators converging here on the Indian side of the international border evening at sunset to watch the ceremony, authorities are readying themselves to cater to bigger numbers with much better facilities later this year.
Work on constructing the Visitors’ Gallery — a horseshoe-shaped stadium that seems to complement the one on the Paksitani side — at Attari is now in full swing and some portions have even been handed over to the BSF where visitors coming for the daily ceremony are being accommodated.
“Earlier, the capacity at the visitors’ gallery was just 5,000 while over 10,000 people used to converge on an average. On rush days and holidays, the numbers used to go up to 15,000 and the BSF found it difficult to accommodate all. Most of the times, hundreds of visitors have to be stopped outside as there is no space to accommodate them,” a BSF officer said here.
Looking at the ever-growing number of visitors coming to watch the ceremony from all over the country and even from other countries, the Ministry of Home Affairs sanctioned a Rs 24 crore project to build a new Visitors’ Gallery at Attari. Work on the project, being undertaken through the Central Public Works Department, started in May 2015 and is likely to be completed by May-June this year.
“The capacity of the new facility will be 15,000 with chairs. However, 25,000 people can be easily accommodated in the same space without chairs,” Baldev Singh, the authorised representative of Satinder Mahajan Construction Company, which is executing the project, said. (IANS)
