The Suchetgarh border post in the Jammu district will daily host the Retreat Ceremony of BSF from Saturday on the pattern of Wagah in Punjab. The Lt. Governor Manoj Sinha will be the chief guest at the ceremony when it begins tomorrow.
This is the first border point in Jammu and Kashmir where the ceremony will be held. However, the Pakistan Rangers will not perform a similar ceremony on their side of the International Border (IB) and the structured parade will be done only by the BSF.
The colourful Retreat Ceremony is performed at three places, Wagah, Ferozepur and Fazilka, in Punjab by the BSF and by the Pakistan Rangers across the IB.
Being a live IB and LOC in Jammu and Kashmir where shelling and exchange of fire have been a daily affair, such ceremony could not be organized.
The ceremony at the Border Observation Post (BOP) at Suchetgarh is expected to attract locals and tourists. Successive governments in J&K have made efforts to promote Suchetgarh in Ranbirsinghpura a place for border tourism. During the pre-partition era, Suchetgarh housed the last octroi post of the kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir and after it, the Sialkot district now in Pakistani Punjab begins. The place had a rail and road link with Sialkot.