NEW DELHI: India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that no ‘surgical strike’ has been carried out in any country, according to the Press Trust of India news service.
In an indirect reference towards the claim of the ‘surgical’ strike ‘somewhere’ inside the territory of Azad Jammu Kashmir, the Indian prime minister reportedly said that India has never attacked any country, nor does it want anyone’s territory. This statement has contradicted Indian Army’s claim of ‘surgical strike’ inside Azad Jammu Kashmir.
“India has not attacked anyone. It is neither hungry for any territory. But in the two World Wars, 0.15 million Indian soldiers had laid down their lives fighting for others,” the prime minister said at a ceremony in New Delhi, the Press Trust of India news service reported.
Modi said the Indian diaspora did not believe in indulging in politics of grabbing power abroad.
Pakistan had already rejected claims of any surgical strike carried out by India. Indian Army, however, recently claimed of surgical strike inside Pakistan boundary, though the state failed to provide any evidence of the attack.
The government of India had convened an All-Parties Conference to take the opposition parties into confidence over the strikes. However, they were left disappointed when no evidence was presented about the circumstances in which the strikes took places, and or whether they were provoked from across the border.
Instead they were shown a press briefing by Indian Director General Military Operations Ranbir Singh who claimed that the Indian Army had conducted surgical strikes on terror launch pads at the Line of Control last night. The press conference was conducted by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs and the Ministry of Defence.
Hindustan Times has said: “On Wednesday night, some of India’s toughest fighting men – soldiers of the elite Parachute Regiment – were heli-dropped at pre-designated sites on the Indian side of the LoC. They crossed the de facto border on foot, and were stealthy enough to maintain surprise.”
However, this was a false claim because mined terrain cannot be crossed unnoticed on foot under efficient surveillance systems working in an operational environment.
The UN Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan has not directly observed any firing across the LoC related to the latest incidents.
